L\NCE 


BOURRU, 
SOLDIER  OF  FRANCE 


BOURRU, 
SOLDIER  OF  FRANCE 

By 
JEAN   DES   VIGNES   ROUGES 

TRANSLATED  BY 
ERNEST  HUNTER  WRIGHT 


NEW  YORK 

E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 
68 1  Fifth  Avenue 


\ 


Copyright,  1919,  by 
E.  P.  BUTTON  &  COMPANY 


All  Rights  Reserved 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


CONTENTS 
PART   I 


CHAPTER  PA<iK 

I  BOURRU 3 

II  TiiK  Division  Facing  the  Hill  8 

III  The  Storming  of  Vauquois     .  18 

IV  After  the  Attack    ....  48 
V  A  Night  Attack 57 

VI  The  Glory  Grows    ....  OG 

VII  Holding  the  Position   ...  70 

VIII  A   Sinister   Duty     ....  00 

IX  Vauquois  the  Tragic    .     .     .  100 

X  A  Hand-Grenade  Battle   .     .  113 

XI  The  Cellar  of  the  Engineers  124 

XII  Shift  Folix)\vs  Shift    .      .      .  180 

XIII  Sentinel   Duty 146 

XIV  A  Visit  from  the  Colonel     .  154 
XV  The  Gravl-s  of  September,  1914  159 

XVI  Bagging  a  Sentinel  ....  170 

XVII  The  Saddest  Duty    ....  180 

XVIII  Waiting  for  a  Mine  to  Explode  191 

XIX  Occupying  the  Mine  Pit  .     .  198 

XX  The  Secret  Garden  ....  207 

XXI  The  Days  of  Tunnels  ...  214 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

XXII    A  Session  with  the  Trench- 
Mortars       218 

XXIII  A   Day   Underground   in   the 

Time  of  the  Mines    .     .  230 

XXIV  The  Cannonade 242 

XXV    A  Relief  at  Night    ....  248 

XXVI    After    Two    "Weeks    in    the 

Trenches 256 

XXVII    Honor  to  Those  Who  Fall  .  265 

XXVIII    Under  Bombardment     .     .     .  274 

XXIX    BouRRU  Visits  Headquarters  .  284 

XXX    An   Expedition   to   the   Rear  292 

XXXI    A  Thought  of  Thoss  Who  Re- 


I  2008  with  funding  from 
IVIicrosL 


301 


THE    WAR   UNDERGROUND 

I  An  Encounter  Underground 

II  A  Rescue 

III  An  Explosion 

IV  Trapped  Underground       .     .     . 
V  The  Exi^losion  of  March  23, 1916 


315 
325 
334 
343 
354 


APPENDIX 

Resume  of  the  Military  Operations 

AT  Vauquois 367 


wBb^ 


PART  OXE 


BOURRU, 
SOLDIER  OF  FRANCE 


BOURRU 


BOURRU  I  But  you  know  him  well 
enough;  he  is  the  soldier,  the  very  one 
you  met  in  the  street  the  other  day. 
He  was  on  furlough,  going  to  Bligny,  a  vil- 
lage of  Burgundy,  and  he  was  taking  good 
advantage  of  his  trip  through  Paris  to  ex- 
amine the  "City  of  Light,"  symbol  of  that 
civilization  which,  gun  in  hand,  he  had  been 
defending  for  two  years.  Oh,  one  could 
IHeasily  see  that  he  is  a  winegrower,  as  his 
'  military  papers  show ;  he  was  walking 
slowly,  cautiously,  half  afraid  of  the  thou- 

*sand  dangers  that  lie  hidden  in  your  streets. 
Being  a  good  patriot,  you  looked  at  him 
affectionately. 


4  BOURRU 

"There  goes  one  of  our  brave  defenders," 
you  said  to  me. 

What  an  honest  face  I  A  little  thin,  but 
heaven  knows  they  don't  take  on  flesh  in  the 
trenches;  however,  his  thinness  didn't  pre- 
vent him  from  having  color  in  his  cheeks,  and 
two  sparkling  eyes  under  a  determined  fore- 
head. It  was  easy  to  guess  that  the  man  was 
used  to  action,  if  only  from  the  way  his  chin 
projected.  A  fine  fellow  of  thirty,  this 
Bourru,  and  not  so  flustered  that  he  had  for- 
gotten to  curl  up  his  mustache  so  as  to  prove 
to  the  Parisians  that  he  was  no  more  of  a 
hayseed  than  they  were.  No  beard;  they 
don't  wear  them  any  more  at  the  front,  on 
account  of  the  gas-masks.  You  understand, 
the  hair  keeps  the  thing  from  pressing  close 
to  the  skin,  and  the  gas  may  penetrate. 
"Shave  yourselves"  was  the  general's  order, 
and  Bourru  cut  off  his  beard. 

But  he  still  had  his  good  old  overcoat 
that  had  been  washed  by  the  April  rains, 
faded  by  the  July  sun,  and  decorated  by  the 


BOURRU  5 

mud  of  the  Argonne — one  of  those  old  rags 
that  look  so  glorious  by  the  side  of  our 
ridiculous  street  clothes. 

And  thus  Bourru  went  on  his  way  toward 
the  Gare  de  Lyon  w  ith  a  rolling  gait,  his  sack 
over  his  shoulder,  his  hat  pulled  down  to  his 
ears,  and  his  heart  heavy  from  the  sight  of  so 
many  scenes  of  death. 

How  I  should  like  to  look  into  the  soul 
fthat  soldier!"  you  confided  to  me.    "We 
all  the  time  hearing  about  some  great 
or  other,  and  there  is  every  reason  for 
But  as  for  me,  I  wish  I  could  look  he- 
ld the  scenes  of  tlie  great  drama  and  share 
emotions  of  it  in  imagination.    It  is  some 
lin  soldier  like  our  friend  there  that  I 
mid  like  to  follow  on  his  daily  round — 
le  nameless  toiler  in  the  war,  some  trooper 
in  the  multitude,  some  peasant  who  has 
ren  up  the  plow  for  tlie  gun — tliat  is  the 
td  of  hero  who  will  remain  the  immortal 
type  of  the  savior  of  France." 

'ou  spoke  with  so  much  enthusiasm  tliat 


6  BOURRU 

I  was  moved  by  it;  the  more  so  because  I 
love  this  Bourru  like  a  friend  and  brother, 
and  when  you  expressed  your  admiration  for 
him  you  made  me  feel  very  proud.  So  as 
soon  as  I  returned  from  my  own  furlough  I 
picked  out  a  typical  Bourru  and  kept  my 
eyes  on  him  day  by  day ;  and  now  I  am  try- 
ing to  sketch  for  you  a  fairly  faithful  picture 
of  him  in  broad  strokes. 

Of  course  you  know  we  have  no  time  here 
in  Camp  8  to  put  the  finishing  touches 
on  things;  so  I  do  not  pretend  that  my 
picture  of  Bourru  is  complete  and  per- 
fect. I  send  him  to  you  just  sketched  in. 
He  will  be  like  one  of  those  rude  wooden  ef- 
figies of  Saint  Martin  which  you  have  seen 
in  old  village  churches,  and  in  front  of  which 
you  felt  your  spirit  moved  because  in  your 
mind's  eye  you  could  see  the  naive  workman 
of  centuries  gone  by,  armed  with  his  sincere 
piety  and  his  shepherd's  knife,  hewing  it  out 
of  the  trunk  of  a  tree. 

Only,  alas!    I  am  not  possessed  of  that 


BOURRU  7 

holy  naivete  of  the  worthy  artists  of  primi- 
tive days.  I  am  only  a  plain  man  of  to-day. 
I  have  had  ostentatious,  complicated  instru- 
ments put  into  my  hand,  and  I  am  bound 
to  use  them.  That  is  why  I  have  been  con- 
vinced by  a  philosophical  friend  that  I  could 
never  really  represent  the  soul  of  Bourru 
unless  I  "posed"  him  in  his  "environment,'* 
in  his  "milieu."  ...  So  let  me  tell  you  first 
about  the  moral  atmosphere  which  reigns 
over  the  region  of  Vauquois  and  which 
Bourru  has  been  breathing  for  many 
months. 


II 


THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE 
HILL 

AT  the  outbreak  of  the  war  Bourru  be- 
longed to  a  division  in  no  way 
signally  different  from  any  other. 
He  was  just  one  of  a  multitude  of  soldiers 
moving  together  in  the  fluctuations  of  the 
army — marching  forward,  then  recoiling  like 
a  wave,  only  to  gather  force  again  immedi- 
ately and  to  dash  over  the  rocks  of  the  ene- 
my's resistance,  which  were  crumbling  be- 
fore the  northward  drive  of  our  soldiers. 
Up  to  now  his  division  had  been  only  one 
great  unit  of  the  French  army,  and  nothing 
more.  These  men,  wandering  over  the  fields 
and  the  meadows  of  the  Meuse,  had  not  yet 


■     THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE  HILL     9 

felt  the  secret  influences  that  spring  from  the 
soil  to  create  kindred  souls  such  as  were  later 
to  make  all  the  sectors  of  the  front  into  so 
many  little  provinces  of  France. 

But  now  the  division  is  to  he  hurled 
against  a  hill  in  the  Argonne  that  rises  in  a 
wooded  curve  hefore  them.  It  is  Vauquois! 
The  enemy  holds  the  summit  and  clings  to 
t  .  .  .  and  a  thrill  runs  through  the  throng 

our  men. 

I  must  tell  you  that  at  the  moment  this 
ivision  is  made  up  mainly  of  Parisians. 

an  you  imagine  how  impetuous  they  are 
coming  to  be?  Paris  means  revolj:  against 
whatever  is  sinister  and  tlu-eatening.  .  .  . 
with  clenched  fists  our  soldiers  are  look- 
ing up  at  the  hill,  a  dark  pedestal  for  the 
men  whose  silhouettes  at  its  top  dishonor  the 
blue  heavens.  .  .  .  How  can  we  stay  loiter- 
ing at  the  base,  in  the  shadow  ? 

Possibly  if  they  were  all  Parisians  they 
might  commit  one  of  those  sublime  follies 
that  have  made  their  history^  illustrious.    But 


10  BOURRU 

scattered  through  the  division  there  are  also 
the  "Bourrus" — the  good  winegrowers  from 
Touraine  and  Burgundy,  the  farmers  from 
Brie.  These  men  are  used  to  the  lessons  of 
Nature;  they  have  looked  upon  rugged 
fields,  and  voiceless  forests,  and  stern  little 
villages ;  and  they  know  that  victory  belongs 
to  the  most  patient.  The  spirit  of  Paris  is 
joined  with  this  of  the  countryside,  inter- 
penetrating, each  acting  as  corrective  to  the 
other — and  the  soul  of  the  division  is  com- 
ing into  being.  It  will  grow  and  take  form 
as  it  attacks  this  great  stronghold — Vau- 
quois ! 

The  days  pass.  Trenches  are  dug,  all 
leading  toward  the  base  of  the  hill — like  long 
arms  preparing  to  take  it  in  their  tentacles. 
For  many  weary  hours  the  men  remain  on 
the  lookout,  contemplating  the  landscape. 
Its  lines  are  printed  indelibly  on  the  minds 
of  them  all.  In  the  morning,  when  the  sun 
comes  up,  the  hill  is  luminous  with  rosy 
light.  ...  It  would  be  fine  to  breathe  the 


THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE  HILL    11 

air  up  there,  and  sing  for  joy,  and  survey  the 
reaches  of  the  landscape  1  .  .  . 

In  their  imaginations  Vauquois  is  a  glor- 
ious prize,  promised  to  the  valiant.  .  .  . 
"When  shall  we  take  it?" 

Once  in  a  while  some  one  mysteriously 
whispers,  "It's  going  to  be  next  week  I"  But 
the  week  crawls  slowly  by,  and  not  yet  has 
the  order  come  to  storm  the  heights.  The 
obsession  grows  stronger  and  stronger — the 
will  strains  at  the  leash.  .  .  .  Are  the  can- 
non growling  a  little  louder  than  usual? 
There  we  are,  the  attack  is  coming!  And 
joy  breaks  its  bounds;  cartridges  are  exam- 
ined, fingers  are  passed  affectionately  over 
the  edge  of  bayonets,  souls  are  steeled  for 
the  supreme  effort.  .  .  .  But  what  are  they 
waiting  for — aren't  we  going  up  ? 

And  yet,  how  many  good  reasons  there 
are  for  seizing  that  position!  Those  who 
know  affairs  love  to  explain  that  the  hill  of- 
fers the  enemy  a  point  of  vantage  from 
which  he  can  test  the  fire  of  his  artillery  by 


12  BOURRU 

direct  observation — that  the  whole  region  is 
commanded  by  that  hill — that  the  Boches  at- 
tach an  extreme  importance  to  it.  "Of 
course,"  chime  in  the  listeners,  "Vauquois 
has  to  be  taken, — it's  the  biggest  military 
operation,  the  most  essential — ^the  only  one 
that  really  is  important  for  France.  .  .  ." 

"We'll  get  Vauquois,  all  right!"  says 
Bourru  to  himself.  "There  are  twenty  thou- 
sand of  us,  and  we  want  it.  ..."  And  he 
goes  on  thinking  proudly  of  the  multitude 
of  human  wills  charged  with  the  common  de- 
sire. They  will  make  a  formidable  mass, 
which  will  break  over  the  hill  like  a  tidal 
wave. 

But  patience  is  still  necessary.  The  hour 
has  not  yet  come ;  the  commanders,  who  have 
to  regulate  this  particular  action  in  accord- 
ance with  larger  plans,  are  waiting  for  the 
favorable  moment.  And  destiny  also, 
doubtless,  wills  that  the  soul  of  the  division 
shall  grow  to  full  life  before  the  terrible  as- 
sault be  attempted. 


THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE  HILL     13 

How  everything  prepares  the  men  for  itl 
The  rough  work,  the  sudden  alarms,  the  can- 
nonades, the  terrible  trials  of  winter, — even 
the  landscape,  which  here  certainly  suggests 
nothing  voluptuous  in  life;  for  in  the  scen- 
ery of  the  Argonne,  that  country  which  his- 
tory has  bathed  in  blood,  there  is  something 
like  a  mystic  invitation  to  sacrifice. 

Now  and  then  a  regiment  will  go  a  little 
way  to  the  rear,  behind  the  forest,  to  a  rest 
camp;  but  the  soldiers  are  so  eager  to  see 
Vauquois  that  they  climb  all  the  heights 
about  to  gaze  at  that  tragic  hill — and  they 
talk  about  it  and  long  for  it  as  for  a  prom- 
ised land. 

The  soul  of  the  division  flames  higher  and 
higher.  If  you  ask  any  one  of  these  men 
what  part  he  is  playing  in  the  great  drama 
of  the  war,  he  will  answer,  "I  am  facing 
Vauquois."  It  is  a  sacred  mission  and  he 
has  accepted  it  with  all  his  heart — as  might 
a  paladin  of  the  olden  time,  charged  to  de- 
liver a  noble  and  beautiful  princess  from  the 


14  BOURRU 

barbarians  who  keep  her  beleaguered.  .  .  . 

Yes,  the  division  stands  here  with  all  eyes 
on  the  hill  over  which  it  will  some  day  surge. 
Once  in  a  while  a  nervous  shock  passes 
through  it,  so  great  is  the  tension ;  impatience 
takes  possession  of  our  battalions  and  makes 
them  stretch  out  eager  hands  toward  the  cov- 
eted height.  .  .  . 

Bourru  remembers  one  of  those  crises.  It 
came  on  February  17,  1915.  The  excite- 
ment broke  out  suddenly  in  his  own  battal- 
ion— and  it  was  a  rainy  day  at  that,  but  the 
chill  wind  blowing  over  the  hills  wrought  on 
a  man's  nerves.  .  .  . 

A  certain  hour  struck.  It  must  have  been 
the  signal  for  some  mysterious  focussing  of 
forces — for  at  that  instant  the  battalion  rose 
as  one  man  at  the  foot  of  the  hill.  In  one 
mad  burst  of  valor  and  patriotism  it  rushed 
up  the  sides  of  the  hill,  its  officers  in  the 
lead.  In  vain !  .  .  .  Bullets  were  whistling, 
but  the  men  charged — like  beings  enrap- 
tured, hypnotized,  with  eyes  lifted  to  heaven 


THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE  HILL     15 

as  to  the  deliverance  of  the  imprisoned 
maid. 

It  was  a  sublime  charge!  Deatli  was  tak- 
ing his  toll,  but  on  one  thought  of  counting 
the  cost — and  the  soil  of  the  Argonne  once 
again  drank  blood  that  would  give  it  a  mean- 
ing still  more  tragic  and  still  more  fruitful 
for  the  children  of  centuries  to  come. 

Bourru  was  in  the  charge.     Side  by  side 

th  him  his  comrades  leaped  forward,  fir- 

,  scaling  walls,  plunging  through  clouds 

smoke.     Men  were  clamoring,  and  the 

rth,  torn  to  bits  by  exploding  shells,  flew 

to  their  wide-open  mouths.     They  swal- 

ed  it  down,  as  if  in  patriotic  communion. 

superhuman  energy  urged  them  on  and 

They  would  stop  a  moment  in  a  shell- 

le,  but  only  to  scramble  out  again  and  rush 

er    forward,    performing    mad    feats    of 

wess  and  valor. 

Bourru  acted  like  the  rest  of  them.    But 
was  it  really  he  who  acted?    No,  it  was  the 
ill  of  the  division,  and  Bourru  was  only  a 


16  BOURRU 

straw  carried  by  that  wind.  In  time  to  come, 
he  will  never  say,  "I  was  at  Vauquois,"  but 
simply,  "We  stormed  the  hill  at  Vauquois." 
It  was  because  he  knew  the  others  wanted 
Vauquois  that  he  wanted  it — and  if  the  oth- 
ers wanted  it  so  madly,  that  was  because  he 
was  there  to  incite  them  and  uphold  them. 

Thus  infatuated,  the  battalion  went  to  the 
very  top  of  the  hill  and  dedicated  to  that 
ground  the  great  sacrifice  of  its  children's 
love,  while  from  a  ravine  nearby  the  inspir- 
ing strains  of  the  Marseillaise  sprang  from 
the  throats  of  trumpets.  .  .  . 

At  their  post  of  command  the  generals 
were  exerting  all  their  skill  and  resolution 
in  directing  the  fighters.  In  a  critical  mo- 
ment, just  when  all  the  desperate  yearnings 
of  the  dying  and  all  the  heroic  impulses  of 
the  victors  swept  through  their  hearts,  a  tear 
of  tenderness  and  admiration  fell  from  the 
eyes  of  one  of  them.  And  this  was  as  it 
should  be,  for  it  is  the  noble  habit  of  the 
French  officer  to  hold  ascendancy  over  his 


THE  DIVISION  FACING  THE  HILL     17 

men  not  only  by  his  soverei^  will  but  by 
his  affectionate  spirit.  And  all  whom  death 
had  overtaken  on  the  hill  could  imagine  that 
the  tear  fell  for  their  sake  and  could  lie  down 
in  sleep  with  the  serenity  of  heroes  who  know 
that  their  sacrifice  has  been  understood. 

Nevertheless,  this  day's  work  was  only  a 
test,  a  bitter  and  glorious  test,  necessary, 
doubtless,  to  fulfill  the  growth  of  the  divi- 
sion's soul  and  give  it  the  sure  faith  of  vic- 
tory.    Twelve  days  later  the  hill  was  to  be 

►tured  definitely. 


Ill 

THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS 


<( 


w 


E'VE  got  to  wipe  out  that  score!" 
Bourru  said  to  himself,  as  he 
thought  of  the  attack  on  the  hill, 
which  had  not  completely  succeeded.  And 
this  meant  quitting  the  trenches  and  advanc- 
ing under  shells  and  bullets,  which  appeared 
to  Bourru  simply  as  a  thing  to  be  done — not 
a  heroic  task  at  all,  but  just  a  piece  of  rough 
work  that  would  require  energies  at  once 
brutal  and  patient. 

It  is  only  the  man  who  lives  on  an  emi- 
nence who  thinks  he  sees  magnificent  out- 
bursts of  heroism  here  and  there.  Bourru, 
in  the  rest-camp,  was  nothing  but  a  soldier 
grumbling,  like  a  thousand  others,  because 

18 


tf 


THE  STORxMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       19 

it  was  raining  and  they  had  to  turn  out  for 
drill.  He  was  even  heard  to  say  that  he  was 
"fed  up  with  it" — an  expression  of  discon- 

nt  that  witnesses  to  the  saying  that  words 
are  given  to  man  for  the  purpose  of  dissem- 
bling his  real  thoughts.  For  here  is  some 
ne  yelling  to  the  camp:  "Attention!  Fall 
in  in  fifteen  minutes — full  packs!"  And  im- 
mediately the  soldiers  hurn  with  excitement. 
"Hello,   there's  something  up!"   they   cry. 

nd  while  it  is  not  joy  that  fills  their  hearts 

for  down  at  the  hottom  there  is  sometliing 

e  anguish — they  still  offer  every  external 

appearance    of    a    feeling    that    resembles 

aiety.     It  is  the  contradiction  in  the  soul 

of  man — his  way  of  dreading  and  loving  in 

he  same  instant  those  unforeseen  dangers  of 

ar  that  set  him  afire. 

They  start  for  the  forest  of  Allieux.  No 
one  knows  why.  .  .  . 

"We're  going  to  storm  Vauquois!"  says 

uguenin. 

"The  deuce  we  are!"   answers   Hubert. 


20  BOURRU 

"Our  battalion  had  its  dose  ten  days  ago. 
It's  not  our  turn." 

The  uncertainty  makes  everybody  fidgety. 
There  is  nothing  more  irritating  than  to  play 
a  part  in  a  mystery.  You  flounder  round 
in  a  fog  that  you  would  like  to  tear  asunder, 
and  you  imagine  all  sorts  of  things;  and  if 
some  one  says  something  with  a  knowing  air, 
even  though  his  supposition  is  improbable, 
the  faces  of  the  most  skeptical  turn  toward 
him  with  eyes  that  show  a  willingness  to  be- 
lieve. 

"It's  no  such  thing!"  says  Bourru.  "Since 
we  have  stacked  arms  and  have  a  nice  quiet 
place  here,  we'd  better  be  careful." 

So  he  pulls  a  chunk  of  bread  out  of  his 
sack  and  eats  it ;  then  he  rolls  himself  up  in 
his  blanket,  stretches  himself  in  the  ditch, 
and  goes  to  sleep. 

The  chilly  dew  wakes  him  about  five 
o'clock.  At  eight,  the  cannonade  is  getting 
livelier.  No  one  is  deceived  this  time — the 
artillery  is  clearing  the  ground  for  an  at- 


■I 


n 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       21 

ack.  It  is  like  a  pack  of  hounds  suddenly 
let  loose  to  rush  bellowing  on  the  quarry. 
"Ah!  Maybe  those  guns  aren't  having  a 
good  time!  Listen  to  that!  Spit  at  'em! 
Blow  'em  up!     Give  it  to  Wilhelm!" 

"Anyhow,  there's  one  thing  sure,"  says  the 
sergeant;  "it's  not  our  battahon  that's  go- 
ing to  attack.    If  it  were,  we'd  be  in  the  first 
ench  already.     They  must  be  holding  us 
reserve." 

Yes,  that  is  it — the  battalion  is  in  reserve, 
secret  joy — the  joy  of  the  physical  ani- 
al,  the  unlovely  joy  that  one  hides — leaps 
ip  at  the  bottom  of  a  few  hearts.  It  is  not 
that  they  want  to  be  slackers,  O  no!  but — 
well,  you  understand — in  the  cold  gray  dawn 
of  a  dripping  forest,  after  a  night  passed  in 
the  bottom  of  a  ditch,  with  a  storm  of  shells 
passing  overhead,  you  haven't  the  same  ar- 
dor as  a  spectator  in  a  reserved  seat  at  the 
cinema  who  is  about  to  witness  an  attack. 
Pie  loses  not  a  jot,  that  benignant  spectator, 
of  the  heroic  emotion.    But  this  Bourru  that 


22  BOURRU 

I  am  telling  you  about — well,  he  is  just  a 
very  ordinary  soldier,  an  "average  speci- 
men" of  humanity,  as  Montaigne  would  say. 
So  he  soliloquizes: 

"You've  got  to  take  what  you  get.  .  .  . 
'Twould  have  been  great,  of  course,  to  be 
one  of  the  first  at  the  top  .  .  .  but  orders 
are  orders.  And  if  I'm  in  reserve,  well — 
so  much  the  better!  Maybe  I  can  save  a 
whole  skin  for  the  next  time.  .  .  ." 

So  the  battalion  stays  in  the  woods.  It 
ought  to  remain  very  calm,  since  it  is  made 
up  of  Bourrus — but  you  are  going  to  see  how 
men  in  crowds  do  queer  things  without  a  mo- 
ment's warning. 

While  the  fusillade  is  crackling  and  the 
cannonade  is  booming,  they  are  anxiously 
waiting  on  the  other  side  of  the  height.  "Is 
it  going  right?  Or  isn't  it?"  There  is  no 
information.  Finally  the  wounded  begin  to 
pass  by,  coming  out  of  the  battle.  They  are 
very  much  worked  up,  and  very  merry. 
Questions  are  thrown  at  them. 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       23 

"Ah  I  We've  done  it  this  time — we've  got 
Vauquois!"  cries  one  of  them.  .  .  .  "It's  all 
going  wrong,"  affirms  another,  with  a  som- 
bre look. 

A  man  whose  face  is  covered  with  blood 
aves  his  arms  and  cries  out : 

"Aha,  old  man,  we've  done  it!  If  you 
had  seen  the  boys  in  my  battalion — how  they 
left  the  trenches  behind  and  went  up  there! 
The  Bodies  were  nowhere  when  we  started 

I  or  'em !  We're  there,  all  right,  we're  at  Vau- 
luois,  I  tell  you!  And  it  was  us,  the  — th 
tttalion  of  the  — th  regiment  that  got  there 
rst!  It  wasn't  the  others,  it  was  us — us!" 
L  And  his  fist  is  beating  at  his  swelling 
reast,  while  an  uncontrollable  pride  shines 
fom  his  eyes.  He  carries  it  off  proudly, 
very  proudly,  before  the  pitiable  little  sol- 
diers of  the  reserve  battalion.  Not  for  all 
the  gold  in  the  world  would  he  wash  off  the 
glorious  blood  that  has  dried  on  his  face. 
Try  to  see  this  scene  with  a  poet's  imagina- 
tion, and  watch  how  the  handsome  heroes  of 


24  BOURRU 

older  days,  with  their  lace  collars,  sink  back 
into  the  shadow — those  heroes  whose  por- 
traits are  displayed  in  the  histories  of 
France.  They  withdraw  with  a  salute  be- 
fore this  shaggy,  bare-breasted  grandson 
who,  marching  along  through  the  mud,  is 
proclaiming  a  victory  which  to-morrow  will 
thrill  the  whole  country. 

In  a  twinkling  the  men  of  the  battalion 
felt  their  hearts  fill  with  regret.  The  ignoble 
joy  of  safety  has  disappeared.  Had  it  even 
existed?  All  of  them  are  convinced  that 
their  dearest  wish  was  always  to  be  in  the 
first  attacking  wave.  Every  one  is  exerting 
himself  to  prove  it  to  the  man  next  him,  and 
in  proving  it  to  the  others  he  proves  it  to 
himself.  And  the  poor,  timid  ones,  in  order 
not  to  feel  like  monstrous  exceptions  in  such 
a  field  of  valor,  hasten  to  declare  louder  than 
the  others  that  they,  too,  wanted  to  win  a 
little  of  the  fine  glory  that  is  going  the 
rounds  up  there  in  the  summit,  amid  the 
thunder  of  the  cannon. 


c 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       25 

Bourru,  although  he  is  vexed  like  the  rest, 
sagely  saying  to  himself,  "There's  a  time 

for  everything — there'll  still  be  enough  to 

do  to-morrow." 

The  night  comes  on.     No  new  orders. 

The  men  go  to  sleep  once  more  in  the  ditches. 

At  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  Bourru  feels 
me  one  shaking  him.    "Hey  I    G^t  up !" 
Orders  are  passed  from  squad  to  squad. 

LLeave  your  packs  behind — make  a  roll  of 
ur  blankets  and  tent-covers — take  rations 
r  two  days,  with  two  hundred  shells  and 
o  hand  grenades  for  each  man — fill  your 

canteens — one   canteen   of   booze   for  each 

squad." 

In  complete  silence  the  soldiers  get  their 

equipment  ready  automatically.     They  are 
t  thinking — it  is  too  early  in  the  morning 
or  thinking. 
They  are  off  through  the  woods.     What 
md  in  these  paths!     And  what  roots  of 
es  slung  across  them!     Ouch!     Grossou 
stumbled  and  run  his  head  into  the  spine 


foi 


26  BOURRU 

of  the  man  before  him.  Bourru  hears 
Lafut  grumbhng  all  the  way  of  his  sleepy 
march : 

"Ain't  that  rotten !  One  canteen  of  booze 
for  a  whole  squad!  .  .  .  Just  enough  to 
wet  a  whistle  .  .  .  choir-boy's  rations.  .  .  . 
Ought  to  have  at  least  three  canteens  to  a 
squad  ...  or  four  .  .  .  yes,  four  can- 
teens. ...  I  said  four,  and  I  guess  I  know. 
.  .  .  Ain't  that  rotten!" 

And  he  continues  his  litany  indefi- 
nitely. 

Richard,  the  young  man  of  a  good  family, 
is  consoling  himself  with  the  thought  that  if 
he  is  killed  to-day  some  one  will  send  his 
mother  the  letter  in  his  pocket,  in  which  he 
has  counselled  her  not  to  weep  for  him. 

As  for  Bourru,  he  is  saying  to  himself: 

"Some  of  us  won't  get  back,  that's 
sure  .  .  .  will  it  be  me?  or  won't  it?  .  .  . 
Oh,  well,  I'll  do  the  best  I  can.  .  .  .  I'm  no 
fellow  to  hang  back  just  because  there's 
trouble.    So  long  as  the  Boches  are  up  there, 


the] 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       27 

we've  got  to  drive  them  out,  that's  all  there 
is  to  it.  .  .  ." 

They  arrive  at  the  foot  of  the  hill  at  a  mo- 
ment when  there  is  no  cannonade.  By  the 
light  of  dawn  they  can  see  what  took  place 
there  the  day  before.  The  troops  had  taken 
Vauquois,  indeed,  but  they  had  not  been  able 
to  hold  it.  The  Bodies  had  reoccupied  the 
enches. 

At  a  turn  in  the  road  our  troop  can  see  a 

p  of  corpses,  those  of  the  day  before, 

ich  there  has  been  time  to  bring  together 

t  not  to  take  away.    Ough!    It  is  like  get- 

g   a    blow    in   the    pit    of   the    stomach. 

erybody  turns  pale  and  mute.  .  .  .  Later 

story  will  be  that  there  were  three  hun- 

d  of  these  bodies  piled  up  like  tree-trunks 

b  be  measured  off  into  cords.     But  you 

know  how  it  is — one's  eyes  multiply  objects 

in  such  circumstances. 

The  morning  passes  while  the  men  stand 

p  in  the  mud  with  the  rain  pouring  over 

their  backs.     What  is  to  be  done?     Up  to 


28  BOURRU 

the  present  no  one  has  come  to  them. 
Everything  seems  to  point  to  an  attack, 
though  nothing  is  absolutely  certain. 

But  now  the  companies  are  massing  in 
parallel  lines  for  the  start.  This  time  the 
meaning  is  clear — the  attack  is  coming. 

"Anybody  that  wants  to  make  his  will," 
cries  a  sergeant  gaily,  "need  only  ask  for  a 
two-weeks'  furlough  to  go  and  see  his  law- 
yer." 

"Above  all,"  advises  a  corporal,  "keep  a 
little  brandy  for  a  toast  when  it's  all  over!" 

On  the  stroke  of  noon  the  artillery  begins 
to  clear  the  way.  And  pretty  work  it  is! 
All  the  guns  hidden  in  forests  within  a  radius 
of  five  miles  are  concentrating  their  fire  on 
the  Boche  trenches.  The  soil,  pulverized, 
leaps  into  the  air  and  falls  back  in  showers 
of  pebbles  and  mud.  Here  and  there  a  hu- 
man body  soars  aloft  like  a  common  bundle 
of  rags.  The  shells  from  the  270's  land  like 
thunderbolts  on  the  hill — they  are  so  big  that 
you  can  see  them  passing  overhead  like  great 


THE  STOR.AIING  OF  VAUQUOIS       29 

bottles  of  champagne,  neck  forward.  \ATien 
they  burst  the  hill  trembles  from  top  to  bot- 
tom— but  you  must  look  sharp,  for  great 
chunks  of  stone  come  crashing  back  as  far  as 
our  own  trenches. 

The  last  vestiges  of  the  village  that  stood 
on  the  top  of  the  hill  vanish  like  a  shock  of 
oats  caught  in  a  whirlwind.  Only  the  big 
tree  in  front  of  what  was  the  church  is  left 
standing,  stripped  and  torn,  but  erect. 

The  screaming  of  the  shells  in  the  air  fi- 
nally produces  a  curious  state  of  nerves. 
Foreheads  are  puckering,  eyes  are  blinking, 
shoulders  are  straining — and  your  fingers 
twitch,  your  teeth  are  on  edge,  you  beat  the 
ground  with  your  feet.  What  an  uproar! 
It  abrades  your  nerves  and  sends  shocks 
through  your  whole  body — it  bursts  your 
eardrums,  shoots  through  your  vitals,  be- 
numbs your  brain,  sends  you  mad.  If  only 
that  would  stop!  Then  we  could  get  down 
to  the  bayonet — quietly.  .  .  . 

for  Bourru,  he  has  nerve-cells  so  well 


30  BOURRU 

organized  that  it  is  hard  to  throw  them  into 
much  disorder.  All  the  while  he  is  looking 
over  the  ground  in  front  of  him,  picking  out 
points  of  vantage  along  the  path  that  he  is 
soon  to  take.  "Here,  now  .  .  .  I'll  get  out 
through  this  hole  .  .  .  then  I'll  go  there.  .  .  . 
I'll  be  well  protected  .  .  .  and  then  there 
.  .  .  and  after  that  along  behind  the  little 
wall  ...  so  then  I  can  climb  up  that  ditch 
without  being  seen  from  above.  .  .  ." 

At  two  o'clock  the  guns  take  a  longer 
range.  The  officers  are  passing  in  and  out 
among  the  men. 

"Boys,  we're  going  up !  The  army  counts 
on  you — follow  us!" 

"All  ready!"  comes  the  reply. 

Ladders  are  set  up  for  going  over  the  top. 
The  men  look  in  one  another's  faces,  grasp 
one  another's  hands.  Of  course,  there  is 
some  agitation,  but  it  is  kept  hidden  imder 
gaiety. 

"Up  we  go,  eh?    Got  to  see  this  through !" 

And  a  laugh  accompanies  the  words.    In- 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       31 

stinctively  a  man's  mind  sees  to  its  own  de- 
fence by  refusing  to  attend  to  trouble  or  to 
think  of  death.  The  deepest  psychologists, 
the  most  skilful  analysts  of  the  human  mind, 
have  never  found  any  better  advice  to  give 
men  who  want  to  be  assured  the  mastery  of 
their  own  wills.  But  Bourru  sums  up  the 
whole  theory  in  one  piece  of  advice  to 
Huguenin : 

"Don't  give  a  rap!" 

As  for  Richard,  tlicre  is  just  one  thing 
that  surprises  him,  and  that  is  his  own  com- 
posure. He  may  say  to  himself  as  much  as 
he  pleases  that  "This  is  going  to  be  terrible"; 
but  it  doesn't  worry  him — the  words  are  just 
empty  sounds  in  his  brain,  like  geometrical 
terms.  There  is  no  anxiety.  Of  course,  the 
psychologist  would  explain  that,  in  the  cir- 
cumstances, he  has  only  an  intellectual  com- 
prehension, but  no  "emotional"  understand- 
ing. 

I^^But  that's  enough  of  your  complicated 


32  BOURRU 

things,  as  Bourru  would  say.  The  bugle 
sounds  the  charge,  and  the  men  are  plunging 
over  the  top,  some  of  them  falling  heavily 
back.  They  are  helping  each  other,  pushing 
each  other  on,  and  all  of  them  are  crying, 
"Go  to  it !  Come  on,  boys !  Don't  be  afraid 
— Vive  la  France!" 

It  is  queer  how  each  feels  the  need  of  re- 
assuring those  round  him  by  throwing  out 
words  of  encouragement. 

Bourru  has  taken  a  bee-line  forward. 

"Gad,  but  this  hill  is  steep!" 

"What  shell-holes  I  You  can  stand  up  in- 
side 'em!" 

"Look  at  the  Boche  trench!  Lord,  what 
a  mess!  .  .  .  Ah,  poor  fellow!  He's  got 
half  his  body  blown  away.  .  .  .  Look  here, 
by  Jove,  the  beasts  had  all  sorts  of  good 
wine.  ..." 

"It's  funny,  but  the  Boches  are  hardly 
shooting  at  all.  That  won't  last.  .  .  . 
Wow!  Did  I  say  they  weren't  shooting? 
Listen  to   those   bullets!  .  .  .  Better   look 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       33 

out.  .  .  .  Still  more  corpses — those  are  yes- 
terday's, though.  .  .  .  Here  come  our 
chums!  .  .  ." 

Squads,  platoons,  and  companies  are  all 
dispersed.  Every  man  is  acting  for  himself, 
scaling  the  hill  as  he  can,  scrambling  over 
walls,  or  stopping  to  spy  out  his  way  from 
a  shell-hole. 

The  Boches  who  still  remain  are  them- 
selves scattered  everywhere,  trying  to  get 
away  or  to  hide  in  any  nook  they  can  find. 
It  is  a  free-for-all  fight,  and  cannon,  ma- 
chine-guns, grenades,  and  rifles  are  all  in  it. 
The  hill  rumbles  with  the  noise  like  a  steel- 
foundry  at  full  blast. 

At  a  certain  moment,  when  Bourru  is 
scrambling  to  the  top  of  a  wall  he  spies  two 
Boches  down  below  him,  in  a  sort  of  hole, 
for  all  the  world  like  hares  in  their  burrow. 
One  of  them  is  wounded  and  trembling. 
The  other,  erect,  loads  his  gun  when  he  sees 
Bourru*s  head  appear.  He  is  just  at  the 
foot  of  the  wall,  and  the  two  men  are  very 


84  BOURRU 

close  to  each  other.  One  of  them  must  kill 
the  other.  .  .  .  Instantly  Bourru's  arm  is 
up,  and — like  a  flash  the  bayonet  enters  the 
German's  shoulder  and  drives  through  his 
body  as  he  sinks,  gasping.  ... 

Maybe  you  think  it's  fun,  you  civilians,  to 
kill  a  man.  And  in  a  case  like  this  you  hear 
yourselves  letting  out  a  yell  like  a  Sioux 
scalping  his  enemy.  But  you  must  remem- 
ber that  our  poor  Bourru  is  no  hero.  Judge 
for  yourself,  for  when  he  feels  his  bayonet 
running  through  soft  flesh,  he  simply  can- 
not hold  the  gun.  .  .  .  What  a  wet  beast, 
pah!  .  .  .  Luckily  the  other  Boche,  down  in 
the  hole,  is  too  badly  wounded  to  seize  the 
moment. 

There  is  no  lack  of  rifles,  all  you  have  to 
do  is  to  pick  one  up.  Bourru  starts  climb- 
ing again,  up  the  path.  "Crash!  Boom!" 
There  are  the  cannon  of  Cheppy  beginning 
to  pound  us.  We  must  look  out — ^the  bul- 
lets are  whistling  fiercely. 

"Hello !    There's  a  sergeant  yelling  to  his 


I 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       C5 

men  to  get  together.  .  .  .  He'll  never  get 
'em.  .  .  ." 

Certain  platoons  have  got  ahead  faster 
than  others,  and  already  some  scared  pris- 
oners are  coming  down.  That  lends  a  man 
courage.  .  .  . 

But  what's  all  that  up  there?  Ah,  hullyl 
Some  of  the  boys  are  already  at  the  summit, 
and  in  the  joy  of  being  the  first  they  are 
standing  on  the  fragments  of  walls,  waving 
their  caps  and  calling  to  the  others  down  be- 
I^Br — at  the  risk  of  stopping  a  hundred  hul- 
^Ks.  It  is  magnificent!  Andthe  timidestman 
^£all  is  seized  witli  a  mad  desire  to  get  up  to 
Bcm,  as  if  he  were  climbing  to  paradise. 

And  at  that  moment  these  splendid  en- 
thusiasts are  seen  by  thousands  of  eyes  that 
watch  their  silhouette  against  the  sky  from 
a  radius  of  ten  kilometers — and  far  away  in 
the  camps  to  the  rear,  thirty  kilometers  dis- 
tant, people  are  crying  out  in  village  after 
village:  "Vauquois  is  ours!  Vauquois  is 
si" 


36  BOURRU 

At  headquarters,  the  general  takes  off  his 
cap,  and,  turning  toward  his  staff,  says : 
"Gentlemen,  remove  your  hats." 
One  would  say  the  men  on  the  hilltop  hear 
the  applause  from  all  the  countryside,  for 
they  never  pause  in  their  dancing  'round  the 
summit,  in  the  thick  of  exploding  shells. 
Beneath  them,  forests  and  valleys  and  riv- 
ers spread  beyond  the  eye's  reach.  ,  .  . 

Suddenly,  at  a  recess  in  the  walls,  Bourru 
recoils  in  horror.  Gods!  In  this  nook  lies 
the  corpse  of  a  French  lieutenant,  killed  yes- 
terday. He  is  riddled  with  bayonet  thrusts, 
his  face  mashed  by  boot-heels,  his  hands  and 
feet  tied  securely  with  wire.  Bourru  knows 
what  savage  drama  must  have  been  enacted 
the  day  before. 

"Ah!  the  beasts!  .  .  .  I'll  fix  one  of  'em 
for  that!" 

Bang!  That  shot  came  from  hard  by — 
it  must  have  been  from  over  there,  at  the 
mouth  of  that  cellar.    Bourru  cries  out: 


r 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       37 

"Some  of  'em  in  the  cellar!" 

He  seizes  a  grenade  from  his  sack,  lights 
it,  and  throws  it  through  the  mouth  of  the 
cellar.  Another  follows  it,  and  the  Boches 
begin  to  howl,  down  inside. 

One  of  his  comrades  passes. 

"Gimme  your  grenades  I"  begs  Bourni. 

And  he  hurls  two  more  into  the  black  hole. 
In  a  moment  a  heap  of  litter  stirs  at  the 
mouth  of  the  cellar,  and  the  Boches  begin  to 
come  out,  hands  in  the  air.  "Kamerad!'* 
Bourru  would  hke  to  kill — but  no,  that  isn't 
done. 

"Here,  take  these  geese  away,"  he  says  to 
his  comrade. 

And  he  goes  on  his  way. 

Zip!  "Ouch!"  Bourru  shakes  his  head. 
A  bullet  has  just  grazed  his  left  thumb. 
Nothing  to  worry  about — he  can  stop  for 
five  minutes  in  a  hole  somewhere  and  dress 
it. 

In  the  same  hole  a  French  soldier  is  ban- 
daging a  Boche.    Queer  sight  for  a  moment 


88  BOURRU 

like  this!  The  Boche  is  joking,  and  empty- 
ing his  pockets  and  purse — ^he  wants  to  pre- 
sent even  his  handkerchief  to  his  amateur 
nurse,  who  declines  it. 

But  a  French  soldier,  who  has  fallen  to 
the  bottom  of  the  hole,  is  saying,  "I've  got 
to  see  what  is  going  on.  .  .  ." 

So  he  digs  his  knee  into  the  wall  of  the 
hole  and  looks  round.  Suddenly  he  gives  a 
wild  cry  and  leaps  erect,  with  his  arms 
aloft,  as  if  a  spring  had  been  let  loose  in- 
side him.  A  ball  has  just  gone  through  his 
heart. 

The  doctor  will  tell  you  that  sometimes 
the  ball  strikes  a  nerve  center  and  produces 
a  reflex  action  from  all  the  nerves  and  a 
spasm  from  every  muscle.  That  is  why  you 
must  not  make  fun  of  the  colored  cuts  of 
Epinal  that  always  show  a  soldier  falling 
backward  with  his  arms  in  the  form  of  a 
cross  or  making  some  wild  gesture.  It  often 
happens  so. 

Gaining  more  and  more  ground,  our  men's 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       39 

advancing  wave  is  close  to  the  church.  Then 
suddenly  there  is  a  terrible  cry. 

"The  Boches  are  counter-attacking.  .  .  . 
They've  turned  our  flank.  .  .  .  Let's  get 
out  of  here!" 

The  men  can  see  nothing,  but  there  was 
such  anguish  in  the  cry  that  without  tliinking 
they  gave  way.  .  .  .  Yes,  indeed,  they  fell 
back  to  the  rear.  .  .  .  Oh  I  I  gave  you  full 
warning — these  are  no  stage  heroes,  these 
Bourrus  of  mine.  One  minute  they  are  go- 
ing ahead  and  the  next  they  are  retreating. 
Of  course,  it  would  be  better  to  have  ma- 
chine-made fellows  who  would  go  ahead  all 
the  time.  There  would  be  no  fear  of  a  panic 
— that  would  be  just  the  thing  I 

But  Bourru  suddenly  looks  back.  Are 
those  a  couple  of  big  brutes  of  Boches  on 
the  wall  there,  laughing  and  showing  their 
yellow  teeth?  Yes,  and  one  of  them  is  put- 
ting his  thumb  to  his  nose.  .  .  . 

It  did  not  stay  there  long,  I  can  assure 
you.    No  one  makes  fun  of  my  Bourrus  with 


40  BOURRU 

impunity.  Huguenin  and  Grossou  turn 
round  toward  the  right,  and  others  conceal 
themselves  on  the  left.  Bourru  crawls  up 
behind  the  wall,  .  .  ,  Ten  minutes  later  the 
brutes  are  lying  low.  They  will  never  put 
thumb  to  nose  again. 

Others  have  come  to  the  rescue.  The 
squad  of  Frenchmen  opens  a  murderous  fire, 
and  the  Boches  fall  or  fly. 

In  a  shell-hole  nearby  a  poor  little  French 
soldier  of  eighteen,  in  his  agony,  is  saying  to 
his  sergeant : 

"Kiss  me,  sergeant,  as  mother  would. 
And  tell  her,  like  a  nice  fellow,  that  I  died 
nobly,  thinking  of  her.  .  .  .'* 

Grossou  is  climbing  out  of  a  cellar  that 
has  served  to  shelter  the  Germans.  His 
arms  are  laden  with  bottles  and  boxes  of 
food  and  cigars.  Everybody  is  shouting 
congratulations  to  him.  But,  in  the  future, 
when  Grossou  tells  the  story,  there  is  one 
thing  he  will  never  fail  to  say: 

"Oh,  yes,  it  was  bully  stuff  in  the  bot- 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       41 

ties.  .  .  .  But  it  was  there  in  that  con- 
founded cellar  that  I  caught  lice — real,  live 
cooties — for  the  first  tinie.  And  IVe  never 
got  rid  of  'em  since  I" 

I  am  only  showing  you  a  few  episodes  of 
the  battle.  You  must  multiply  them  by  a 
hundred — by  a  thousand.  Moreover,  to  un- 
derstand what  happened,  you  must  needs 
have  been  stationed  very  high  and  very  far 
away  to  see  all  these  men  climbing  the  hill 
and  swarming  little  by  little  to  its  top  during 
a  cannonade  that  woke  echoes  all  through  the 
Argonne.  But  no  one  can  see  a  battle  in  its 
entirety.  And  it  is  not  possible  to  reproduce 
the  multitudinous  scenes,  of  every  kind  be- 
tween the  sublime  and  the  grotesque,  that 
take  place  side  by  side. 

Every  shell  hole  is  a  refuge  for  the 
wounded,  and  there  the  one  essential  act  of 
the  great  drama  plays  itself  out.  One  man 
is  dying  with  his  lips  to  a  photograph.  An- 
other is  crying  "Vive  la  FranceT    A  third 


42  BOURRU 

is  looking  at  his  mutilated  leg  and  murmur- 
ing, "And  how  am  I  to  plow  my  fields 
now?" 

Bravery,  love,  regret,  anguish,  devotion — 
all  the  emotions  of  man  are  at  the  boil- 
ing point  in  these  earthen  kettles  hollowed 
out  by  explosives. 

Behind  each  bit  of  wall  heroes  are  at 
work,  making  peep-holes  or  laying  out 
trenches. 

A  moment  comes  when  the  human  wave 
gathers  force  to  rush  on  further,  past  the 
church.  It  overleaps  every  obstacle  in  its 
way.  .  .  .  But  our  own  artillery  does  not 
know  of  this  final  rush,  for  all  the  telephone 
wires  have  been  cut.  So  the  onrush  of  our 
soldiers  plunges  them  up  to  the  barrage  laid 
down  by  our  75 's,  which  at  this  moment  con- 
stitutes an  impassable  barrier  between  them 
and  the  enemy.  They  must  needs  pause 
now. 

They  stop  and  wait.  The  night  is  coming 
on. 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       43 

Then  an  alarm  sounds.  The  Germans 
are  counter-attacking  and  have  just  driven 
a  party  of  our  troops  back  some  two  hun- 
dred yards.  But  the  artillery  has  been 
warned.  Our  shells  fall  like  thunderbolts. 
Over  the  massed  Germans  the  75*s  rain 
shells  that  scatter  among  the  men  and  send 
limbs  flying  through  the  air.  It  is  as  if  a 
giant  were  planting  his  heel  on  an  ant-hill. 
And  the  corpulent  Captain  Cliartier,  who  is 
conmianding  the  battery  on  the  opposite 
hill,  is  red  in  the  face  from  the  pleasant  ex- 
citement. He  is  shouting,  swearing,  bellow- 
ing, gesticulating,  stamping: 

"Go  to  it!  .  .  .  wind  your  way!  .  .  .  strike 
*em  down!  ...  in  tens,  in  fifties,  in  hun- 
dreds! .  .  .  Cut  'em  down!  Fire  faster! 
Don't  stop.  .  .goit!.  .  .  .  Give 'em  hell !" 

Over  there  where  the  shells  are  falling  the 
grass  grew  green,  last  summer.  .  .  . 

"It's  always  well  to  put  plenty  of  manure 
in  the  soil,"  says  Bourru.  And  he  knows 
the  business. 


44  BOURRU 

The  night  has  come  and  spread  peace  over 
all  the  countryside.  But  apparently  the 
heavens  feel  that  darkness  is  insufficient 
to  hide  the  work  of  man,  for  snow  begins 
to  fall  softly,  covering  all  the  crumbled 
walls  and  hideous  corpses;  covering  the 
moaning  wounded,  and  the  heroes  who 
sleep. 

All  day  long  brutality  and  uproar  have 
been  masters  here.  Now  another  force — one 
that  reigns  in  silence — is  taking  possession 
of  the  place.  And  such  is  the  majesty  of  its 
power  that  all  the  soldiers,  motionless  now, 
give  themselves  up  to  it  with  the  religious 
fervor  of  a  Carthusian,  standing  like  a 
statue  on  his  promontory  in  the  white  moon- 
light, and  meditating  on  the  fierce  cata- 
clysms out  of  which,  centuries  since,  sprang 
the  wondrous  landscapes  of  his  Alpine 
home. 

"Some  day,"  the  soldiers  are  thinking,  as 
they  rest  from  their  work  of  bloodshed, 
"some  day  there  will  be  born  out  of  our  very 


i 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       45 

fury  of  this  hour  a  splendid  tiling  which  men 
will  contemplate  with  awe  and  admiration." 
The  dread  law  that  rules  the  universe  de- 
crees that  everything  of  heauty  must  receive 
at  its  birth  the  mark  of  violence  and  hor- 
ror I 

Motionless,  behind  a  heap  of  stones, 
Bourru  has  been  standing  guard  for  three 
hours  against  a  possible  return  of  the  enemy. 
Not  one  of  his  fellows  has  come  to  his  re- 
',  though  three  or  four  are  sleeping  not 
her  than  ten  paces  from  him.     In  spite 

the  dark  night  he  can  easily  distinguish 
their  bodies  lying  sheltered  in  the  shell- 
holes. 

"This    is    pretty    tough,"    he    grumbles. 
Bt's  about  time  some  of  those  fellows  took 
aturn.  .  .  .  I'll  tell  'em  so.  .  .  ." 
—And  he  goes  over  to  shake  one  of  the  sleep- 

"Hey  there!  Come  and  take  my  place  a 
while.  .  .  ." 


46  BOURRU 

But  the  man  lies  stiff  and  cold.  He  is  a 
corpse ! 

"Ah!  Forgive  me,  old  chap,"  murmurs 
Bourru,  with  a  quick  salute. 

And  the  other  human  forms  which  the 
snow  is  burying  are  also  corpses. 

"It's  all  right,  boys,"  thinks  Bourru. 
"Rest  easy.  I'll  watch  over  you  and  keep 
you  from  harm.  The  Boches  shall  not  have 
you " 

And  he  retires  behind  his  heap  of  stones. 
He  feels  his  powers  being  multiplied,  as  they 
were  years  ago,  on  the  day  when  his  dy- 
ing father  bequeathed  to  him  the  duty  of 
taking  care  of  the  fields  and  vineyards  of 
the  family.  It  is  the  instinctive  habit  of 
every  Bourru  to  take  the  work  that  must  be 
done  as  a  sacred  obligation  to  which  individ- 
uals, families,  races  must  submit  their  wills. 
This  is  their  substitute  for  the  soulful  ecsta- 
sies in  which  some  other  men  take  such  happy 
pride.  That  is  why  our  Bourru,  serene  in 
soul,  clings  to  the  top  of  that  hill  of  France. 


p 


THE  STORMING  OF  VAUQUOIS       47 

"If  I  am  hit,"  he  thinks,  "there  will  al- 
ways be  some  good  chap  to  take  my  place 
and  finish  the  job." 


IV 

AFTER  THE  ATTACK 

WE  have  taken  Vauquois — and  now 
we  must  hold  it!  This  afternoon, 
on  reaching  the  heights,  our  sol- 
diers danced  with  joy  on  the  hill-top,  dis- 
regarding shells  and  bullets ;  by  the  way  they 
raised  their  arms  and  brandished  their  rifles 
you  would  have  thought  the  hill  too  low  a 
pedestal  for  their  glory.  Higher!  still 
higher!  Up!  the  top  of  the  ruins!  There 
let  us  leap  and  dance.  Ah !  if  one  could  only 
soar  into  the  heavens,  above  the  peaks  of  the 
Argonne,  like  angels  on  golden  wings  I 
What  joy! 

But  it  is  no  such  flight  of  glory  that  awaits 
them.    Stern  necessity  is  going  to  impose  its 

48 


AFTER  THE  A' 

[aw  upon  them.  They  must  burrow  down 
into  the  conquered  soil,  bury  themselves  in 
it  in  order  to  cling  to  it. 

Little  by  little  Bourru  grows  conscious  of 
the  rude  task.  Around  two  o'clock  in  the 
morning  he  says  to  himself:  *'If  I  don't 
want  to  stop  a  bullet  like  a  fool  as  soon  as 
the  day  comes,  I'd  better  dig  a  trench." 

And,  indeed,  it  is  the  moment  for  this. 
The  counter-attack  against  the  church  is 
over,  and  all  is  quiet.  The  night  is  not  too 
dark.  Bourru  ought  to  make  a  burrow  for 
himself  in  the  spot  to  which  chance  has 
brought  him. 

But  he  is  so  tired!  An  overpowering 
numbness  pins  him  to  the  ground;  the  fall- 
ing snow  envelops  him  little  by  little  in  a 
white  coverlet  which  he  has  not  even  the 
heart  to  shake  off.  Some  hours  ago,  the  ex- 
citement of  feeling  that  he  was  the  guardian 
l^fethese  ruins  and  of  his  dead  comrades  sus- 
tained him,  but  now  he  can  do  no  more  than 
cast  a  glance  from  time  to  time  in  the  direc- 


50  BOURRU 

tion  of  the  enemy,  over  the  stones  that  are 
protecting  him.  His  mind  is  drifting  in- 
ertly. The  scenes  of  the  day  just  past  flit 
before  it,  as  at  the  cinema,  though  he  is  not 
directing  the  succession  of  them.  The  same 
pictures  pass  and  repass  inexorably — crum- 
bling walls,  stiff  corpses,  smoke-clouds  from 
bursting  shells.  He  hears  the  shells  explod- 
ing, the  balls  whistling,  the  men  yelling. 
Stupefied  and  sick  at  heart,  Bourru  looks 
on  and  listens.  .  .  .  He  is  so  weak  .  .  .  for 
some  fourteen  hours  he  has  eaten  nothing, 
and  his  last  sleep  was  so  long  ago ! 

From  time  to  time,  nevertheless,  he  makes 
an  exertion.  "I'm  here  to  stay,  all  the  same, 
and  the  Boches  shall  not  pass  I" 

They  have  no  wish  to  try  it,  moreover. 
Twenty  yards  away,  on  the  descending 
slope,  they  can  be  heard  stirring  about. 
Bourru  has  a  good  command  of  their  posi- 
tion and  every  so  often  he  fires  a  shot 
through  the  dark  to  let  them  know  that 
"there  is  company  present." 


AFTER  THE  ATTACK  .^l 

But  these  fits  of  energ>'  do  not  last  long. 
It  is  very  cold,  and  Bourru  has  no  feeling 
left  in  his  legs.  That  is  rather  pleasanter,  if 
anything;  the  numhness  lays  hold  on  his 
spirits.  And  his  thoughts  run:  "Suppose  I 
took  one  little  nap?  .  .  .  Xo,  no,  I'd  het- 
ter  scoop  out  a  hole  for  myself.  .  .  .  But 
pshaw!  the  Boches  won't  start  anything 
now.  .  .  .  Yes,  but  .  .  .  Oh,  well,  I'll  turn 
in  for  just  one  minute.  .  .  ."  Hello,  there's 
a  fog  coming  on.  It  invades  the  very  soul  of 
the  man;  it  envelops  all  things  and  holds 
them  motionless  and  soundless  in  its  blan- 
ket. Bourru  dreams  of  the  delights  of  warm 
comfort  and  savory  food  .  .  .  but  in  its  turn 
there  comes  gliding  into  his  weary  brain  a 
frightful  nightmare.  Suddenly  he  awakes, 
and  finds  himself  stammering:  "Hold  on 
there!  I'm  choking!  Help!  I'm  com- 
ing " 

"By  Jove,  I  went  to  sleep!"  says  Bourru, 
as  he  looks  round.  The  snow  makes  the 
night  livid,  and  a  bitter  taste  persists  in 


52  BOURRU 

our  soldier's  mouth.  His  tongue  feels 
heavy. 

"I've  got  to  begin  digging  a  trench,"  he 
thinks. 

But  where  are  the  fellows  to  help  him? 
In  vain  he  tries  to  remember  when  he  lost 
sight  of  them.  Perhaps  they  are  dead,  like 
those  lying  nearby,  who  look  as  if  they  are 
sleeping  but  will  never  wake  again. 

Bourru  feels  terribly  alone.  "And  the 
Boches  are  going  to  counter-attack  to-mor- 
row, that's  certain.  .  .  .  Well,  I  must  get  to 
work,  then,  and  dig  a  hole  for  myself!  .  .  . 
No,  I'll  rest  just  one  little  minute  more. 
Maybe  some  one  will  come  to  order  me  down 
from  here.  And,  anyway,  what's  the  use  of 
fighting  any  more?  I'm  never  again  going 
to  see  my  little  house  sleeping  by  the  side  of 
the  vineyard,  under  the  shade  of  the  big 
walnuts,  where  mother  is  waiting  for  me! 
Oh,  misery!"  Bourru  wants  to  cry  like  a 
baby. 

Heap  no  scorn  on  him.    Possibly  you  are 


AFTER  THE  ATTACK  53 

one  of  those  that  admire  only  the  "super- 
men" whose  determination  never  flinches. 
That  is  your  privilege,  only — well,  go  a  little 
easy,  and  don*t  force  my  Bourru  to  feel  too 
keenly  that  he  is  nothing  but  an  ordinary 
mortal,  because,  you  know,  it  is  just  ordinary 
mortals  like  him  that  take  Vauquois ! 

But  I  know  you  understand  him,  this 
plain  soldier  and  brother  of  us  all,  and  it  may 
even  be  that  you  sympathize  with  his  fear — 
for  it  is  an  honest,  terrible  fear  that  suddenly 
seizes  him  as  a  volley  of  bullets  goes  whist- 
ling over  his  head.  You  can  hear  them,  eh  ? 
those  ill-mannered  bullets  that  as  they  pass 
seem  to  spit  out  a  message  of  hate  at  you — 
"Ah,  how  I  should  like  to  pink  you  in  a  soft 
place  1"  But  our  man  is  flat  on  the  ground. 
In  their  spite  the  bullets  spatter  against  the 
rocks  with  a  sound  of  a  furiously  cracked 
whip.  Under  such  displays  of  ill-will  bent 
on  your  destruction  you  first  throw  your- 
self down  and  make  yourself  as  small  as  you 
can;  but  by  and  by  exasperation  gets  the 


54  BOURRU 

better  of  you.  "No,  you  don't  catch  mel" 
you  say. 

And  that  is  why  Bourru  finally  comes  out 
of  his  torpor.  Seizing  the  pick  and  shovel 
attached  to  his  belt,  though  still  keeping  his 
prone  position,  he  begins  to  scrape  the 
soil.  ...  A  stone  turns  up — good!  that  will 
serve  to  reinforce  the  little  pile  now  shelter- 
ing him. 

But  the  Boches  in  front  have  already 
heard  him  working;  at  each  noise  he  makes 
the  bullets  redouble  their  rage. 

Suddenly  Bourru  hears  somebody  crawl- 
ing near  him.  .  .  .  By  Jove,  it's  Lach- 
ardl  .  .  .  The  two  waste  no  time  deciding 
on  a  method  of  collaboration.  One  of  them 
keeps  his  gun  to  his  shoulder,  pointed  at  the 
enemy;  the  moment  he  sees  a  shadow  move 
he  fires — often,  indeed,  he  lets  fly  a  bullet 
without  seeing  anything.  Meanwhile  the 
other  digs  furiously.  But  what  hard 
ground!  If  on  the  surface  there  is  mud 
mixed  with  snow,  just  beneath  is  nothing  but 


AFTER  THE  ATTACK  55 

stones  firmly  ensconced.  One  tears  them 
out,  somehow,  and  piles  them  up  before  him. 
But  it  is  too  dark  to  balance  them,  and  once 
in  a  while  they  fall  back  again. 

To  do  this  work  lying  down  is  not  easy. 
You  cannot  raise  your  arm  in  the  air  to  give 
force  to  your  pick;  so  you  must  bear  down 
liard  on  it  from  your  prone  position;  still  it 
won't  penetrate.  The  spade  is  no  better — 
you  shove  it  under  a  little  heap  of  mud  you 
want  to  throw  out ;  and  the  mud  is  so  liquid 
that  it  spreads  about  and  runs  off;  you  have 
only  a  few  ounces  left  to  throw.  In  your  rage 
you  take  to  scooping  it  up  with  your  hands. 
That  is  better, — but  you  must  hurry  up! 

Every  fifteen  minutes  the  men  relieve 
each  other,  one  watching,  the  other  working. 
It  is  queer,  but  for  all  that  he  is  a  Parisian 
with  soft,  white  hands,  I^rachard  can  scoop  up 
stones  and  mud  as  if  he  had  done  nothing 
else  all  his  life. 

The  main  thing  is  to  hurry  up  and  get  a 
hole  dug,  here  and  not  elsewhere;  for  it  is 


56  BOURRU 

easy,  now  that  the  dawn  is  beginning  to 
break,  to  see  that  a  little  later  on  the  spot 
where  the  two  men  are  working  will  be  a 
magnificent  trench-site,  from  which  they  will 
be  able  to  survey  the  whole  northeastern 
slope  of  the  hill.    So  one  must  hurry. 

"But  the  other  fellows,  where  are  they?" 
asks  Bourru. 

"They're  coming,"  answers  Lachard. 

And,  in  fact,  other  shadowy  forms  crawl 
into  line  with  our  two  soldiers  and  begin  in 
their  turn  to  scratch  the  surface  of  the 
ground. 

When  the  full  light  of  day  bathed  the 
peaks  of  the  Argonne,  there  were  no  soldiers 
to  be  seen  above  ground.  Like  so  many  in- 
visible creatures  of  the  soil,  the  men  had  sunk 
into  the  surface  of  the  hill.  From  now  on 
their  silhouettes  would  never  stand  out  to 
view  from  the  country  round.  .  .  .  Death, 
suddenly  overcome  with  shame,  had  taken  to 
concealment  underground  in  order  to  con- 
tinue his  work. 


A  NIGHT  ATTACK 

ON  the  whole,  that  was  easy  enough, 
the  taking  of  Vauquois — so,  I  fancy, 
you  are  thinking  after  what  you 
have  read,  and  I  readily  admit  that  Bourru 
did  get  to  the  top  of  the  hill  without  great 
damage.  But  I  must  tell  you  that  I  feel 
some  remorse,  and  that  I  have  a  sad  sense  of 
the  artificial  character  of  my  poor  story. 
How  many  emotions  nmst  remain  untold — 
emotions  which,  nevertheless,  run  the  gamut 
from  suhlime  ecstasy  to  mad  terror.  You 
know  well  enough,  of  course,  that  tlie  whole 
soul  of  man,  in  all  its  glory  and  all  its  hase- 
ness,  exhibits  itself  in  a  bloody  night-attack. 
But  will  any  one  ever  dare  show  you  the  en- 

57 


68  BOURBU 

tire  picture?  Your  worship  of  our  heroes  is 
so  tender  that  from  time  to  time  the  writer 
feels  a  veil  of  idealism  irresistibly  thrown 
over  the  visions  that  crowd  each  other  in  his 
mind. 

Still,  you  must  not  suppose  that  the  Ger- 
mans let  us  take  Vauquois  at  our  ease. 
There  was  one  corner  of  the  village  where  a 
troop  of  them,  more  spirited  than  the  oth- 
ers, held  their  position.  The  French  ranks 
had  swarmed  over  the  hill,  seemingly  with- 
out regular  order,  though,  of  course,  the 
watchful  eyes  of  their  officers  directed  them, 
and  throughout  the  night  the  staff  knew  that 
the  site  of  the  half-demolished  village  church 
was  an  important  center  of  resistance  which 
attacks  from  mere  detachments  could  not  re- 
duce. A  well-planned  and  determined  ac- 
tion would  be  necessary  at  that  point. 

Toward  evening,  therefore,  two  companies 
receive  an  order  to  go  up  and  shatter  this 
little  isle  of  resistance. 

It  is  already  night  when  the  men  push  into 


A  NIGHT  ATTACK  69 

the   wrecked    connecting   trenches.      They 

have   to   step   over   innumerable   obstacles, 

luckily  covered  by  the  snow.    It  is  the  first 

time  these  soldiers  have  crossed  this  ground. 

*' Which  way  is  the  enemy?"  asks  one. 

*'What  are  we  going  to  do?"  others  in- 

uire  anxiously. 

hen  they  arrive  at  a  certain  point,  or- 
ers  go  round  in  mufiled  tones.  They  are 
going  to  storm  the  church  site  at  the  point 
the  bayonet, 
ut  where  is  it,  this  church?  Staring  all 
about  them  in  the  dark,  they  can  see  nothing 
but  remnants  of  shattered  walls  full  of  holes. 
A  sergeant  has  his  troop  face  precisely  the 

Pong  direction. 
PLook  out,  you're  turning  your  back  to 
I  objective,"  comes  an  officer's  reprimand. 
pYou  think  so,  lieutenant?" 
"Xo  doubt  about  it." 
The  captain  comes  up.    "Xo,  no,  not  that 
way!    You  are  not  to  attack  on  the  right, 
but  on  the  left,  along  by  the  wall." 


quire 

ders 
goin 


60  BOURRU 

All  eyes  are  wide  open,  and  everybody  is 
bracing  himself  on  the  stony  ground.  There 
is  muttered  conversation. 

"Keep  quiet!" 

"Now,  you  start  from  here  .  .  .  come  on, 
first  platoon,  take  position  in  one  line." 

"No,  no, — the  major  told  me  to  place  my 
men  in  groups  of  four  here." 

Luckily  the  Boches  have  not  been  roused ; 
there  is  only  the  crack  of  a  rifle  here  and 
there. 

"Are  you  ready,  sergeant?  We'll  attack 
in  half  an  hour  when  everybody  is  in  posi- 
tion." 

"Yes,  but  my  watch  has  stopped." 

"Well,  whatever  you  do,  don't  go  striking 
a  match  to  see  what  time  it  is — ^we  must  sur- 
prise those  fellows.  The  other  company  will 
attack  over  there  on  the  right;  we'll  go  for 
them  on  the  left." 

For  two  hours  the  men  have  been  champ- 
ing the  bit  in  this  confusion.  You  can  pic- 
ture the  scene,  I  suppose?    You  can  see  the 


A  NIGHT  ATTACK  61 

dark  forms  in  the  shadows,  hiding  hehind 
fragments  of  wall.  This  is  no  game  of  mov- 
ing men  about  on  paper  or  planting  flags  on 
a  map;  this  is  a  game  where  you  may  find 
yourself  grabbing  the  arm  of  some  tired,  ex- 
cited, half-crazed  man  and  telling  him,  "Xo, 
no,  old  fellow,  that's  not  the  place  to  aim! 
You  were  firing  on  our  own  men ;  aim  over 
here!"  The  officers  have  to  be  everywhere 
at  once;  the  captains  run  from  one  platoon 
to  another,  and  platoon-leaders  and  squad- 
leaders  multiply  warnings  and  commands. 
They  go  from  man  to  man,  speaking  in  whis- 
pers, giving  to  Paul,  whom  they  do  not 
recognize  in  the  dark,  an  order  that  was 
meant  for  Pierre,  straightening  out  the  lines 
of  the  troops,  looking  out  for  a  possible  cow- 
ard who  may  perhaps  try  to  evade  the  at- 
tack by  playing  dead  in  a  hole  somewhere, 
and  holding  back  the  impatient  ones  who 
would  start  at  once — to  get  it  over  more 
quickly. 

Ah!     It  was  pleasanter  in  the  old  days 


62  BOURRU 

when  the  officer,  perched  proudly  on  his 
horse,  turned  to  his  troops  in  line  of  battle, 
facing  the  sun,  and  cried:  "Gentlemen,  se- 
cure your  hats,  for  we  are  going  to  have  the 
honor  of  charging!"  Here  there  is  nothing 
but  darkness,  mud,  and  ruins  of  houses,  out 
of  which  men  must  be  brought  to  plunge  for- 
ward, all  together,  at  one  given  moment — 
men  who  will  rush  straight  ahead  without 
seeing  anything  in  front  of  them,  and  who 
will  not  succeed  in  their  enterprise  unless 
there  is  perfect  coordination  in  their  ef- 
forts. 

At  last  the  sections  of  troops  seem  placed 
correctly,  the  men  all  in  straight  lines — near 
to  their  yet  uncollected  wounded  comrades 
of  the  afternoon,  who  are  still  groaning. 
Some  one  is  saying  to  them: 

"Keep  quiet,  will  you?  You'll  have  them 
spotting  us — and  it  does  no  good  to  com- 
plain." 

Eleven  o'clock !  In  fifteen  minutes  we  are 
off.    But  a  new  order  is  going  the  rounds — 


A  NIGHT  ATTACK  63 

the  attack  is  put  off  till  midnight.  The  men 
lie  down  in  their  tracks. 

"Anyway,  I'm  going  to  swallow  every- 
thing in  my  sack,"  declares  one  man;  "then 
if  I'm  killed,  the  Boches  will  get  no  grub 
off  me  r 

For  the  moment  all  is  quiet  on  the  top  of 
the  hill.  The  night  seems  preparing  for  the 
spectacle  that  is  about  to  be  presented. 

Five  minutes  to  twelve.  .  .  . 

"Fix  bayonets,"  command  the  sergeants. 

A  man  who  has  lain  wounded  since  yes- 
terday afternoon,  and  who  has  been  com- 
plaining, stops  his  groans  to  draw  his  bayo- 
net and  pushes  it  toward  a  comrade  ready  to 
start : 

"Here,  old  chap,  take  my  bayonet;  I  had 
sworn  to  plant  it  in  a  Boche — put  it  on  the 
end  of  your  gun  and  square  my  account." 

The  start  must  be  made  in  complete  si- 
lence. But  suddenly,  at  the  moment  when 
the  men  are  getting  to  their  feet,  a  bugle 
rings  out,  sounding  the  charge — What  a 


64  BOURRU 

break !  Imagine  a  bugler  in  his  bugling  zeal 
giving  the  alarm  to  the  Boches!  Go  and 
talk  about  it  with  the  men  who  have  lived 
through  that  night  on  the  hill;  when  they 
think  of  that  untimely  bugler  their  faces  still 
screw  up  with  scorn.  For  you  may  be  as- 
sured the  Boches  immediately  knew  what 
threatened  them  and  set  their  machine  guns 
spitting. 

No  one  ever  learned  the  name  of  that 
bugler.  I  suppose  it  was  some  simpleton 
full  of  legends  of  the  brave  days  of  old,  of 
pictures  of  Epinal  and  popular  songs,  who 
thought  to  achieve  glory  at  one  bound  by 
giving  voice  to  his  trumpet  at  this  historic 
moment.  I  imagine,  too,  that  in  the  sequel 
he  must  have  learned  his  mistake,  and  that, 
since  no  one  knows  him,  he  must  have  writ- 
ten his  name  among  the  "missing"  whom  the 
upheaved  sides  of  that  hill  still  enclose* 

The  attack  was  launched,  nevertheless,  for 
it  was  too  late  to  stop  it.  It  was  brief. 
From  every  side  bullets  sped  in  showers. 


A  NIGHT  ATTACK  65 

Nothing  could  be  seen  but  shadows  that 
moved  for  an  instant  against  the  sky  and 
then  sank  to  earth.  The  two  companies 
eddied  hke  leaves  caught  in  a  tornado.  Pla- 
toons hurled  themselves  on  each  otlier  in 
their  confusion ;  men  fled  straight  toward  the 
enemy,  thinking  they  were  retreating;  ofli- 
cers  yelled  orders  that  could  not  be  lieard; 
and  soldiers  vainly  died  whom  wives  and 
mothers  were  to  weep  for. 

Plalf  an  hour  later  it  was  all  over;  on  each 
side  the  combatants  were  regaining  their 
positions.  It  was  probably  deemed  unneces- 
sary to  attaok  again,  for  everywhere  else  on 
the  hill-top  we  held  the  important  points. 

And  on  the  pages  of  the  history  of  the 
great  war  this  infinitesimal  incident  will  re- 
ceive not  even  the  tribute  of  a  line.  .  .  .  An 
insignificant  episode,  the  historian  of  the  fu- 
ture will  say,  as  he  passes  to  another  docu- 
ment. 


VI 
THE  GLORY  GROWS 

COMING  down  from  Vauquois 
Bourru  had  no  notion  that  he  was  a 
hero — not  in  the  least.  Weariness 
makes  for  a  good  deal  of  confusion  in  our 
ideas  of  glory,  cramping  them  and  forbid- 
ding their  natural  expansion.  If  some  little 
trace  of  pride  comes  into  consciousness,  a 
wave  of  darkness  immediately  appears  to 
submerge  it.  However,  after  you  say, 
"Well,  after  all,  we  seem  to  have  brought 
off  a  victory,"  the  idea  will  not  radiate 
through  your  mind  and  expand  like  the 
splendid  enthusiasms  that  filled  you  with 
their  warmth  and  light  when  you  were  rest- 
ing comfortably  after  a  good  dinner. 

66 


GROWS  67 

for  Bourru,  to-night  he  just  lets  the 
ranks  of  soldiers  carry  him  along  back  to 
A ;  his  head  is  hanging  and  he  is  stum- 
bling over  the  shell-holes.  He  has  already 
tumbled  down  several  times  and  has  had 
hard  work  regaining  his  feet.  You  must  re- 
member that  he  has  had  three  days  and 
nights  of  working  and  fighting,  and  that  is 
enough  to  weaken  any  man's  legs.  They 
are,  indeed,  so  feeble  that  Bourru  scarcely 
has  enough  strength  to  pull  tliem  out  of  the 
mud  when  tliey  sink  in  to  the  knee.  Ah  I 
that  sticky  clay,  how  it  chngs!  At  the  cast 
of  a  shoe  Bourru  gets  free  from  one  place, 
to  find  another  hole  a  hundred  yards 
farther  on  and  stick  fast  in  that.  This  time, 
strangely  enough,  it  seems  rather  nice  to  be 
caught  in  the  mud.  He  would  never  liave 
thought  that  it  was  so  comfortable  to  lie 
quiet  in  a  mud-hole.  No  need  to  move ;  it's 
delightful  just  like  this.  So  Bourru  is 
nearly  off  to  sleep,  stuck  fast  in  the  mud. 
IHey,  old  chap,  shake  a  leg!    You  don't 


68  BOURRU 

want  to  stop  here,  do  you?"  It  is  Francois 
scolding,  while  he  seizes  Bourru  by  the  arm 
and  pulls  him  up. 

And  then  they  plod  along,  arm  in  arm. 

0  *  ^  *  * 

It  is  twenty-four  hours  later  when 
Bourru  remembers  that  he  was  one  of  those 
who  "stormed  Vauquois."  Up  to  this  mo- 
ment he  has  been  sleeping  in  the  corner  of 
a  barn. 

Already  the  soldiers  are  writing  history 
— as  you  can  see  from  the  long  letters  they 
are  scrawling,  their  knees  doing  service  for 
desks.  They  fill  pages  upon  pages.  Ah! 
The  "old  folks"  and  the  wives  and  the  chil- 
dren will  have  something  to  read  back  home ! 

Bourru  does  as  the  rest.  He  pretends  that 
he  has  his  aged  mother  there  before  him, 
and  he  starts  in  to  "tell  her  about  it."  This 
is  one  of  the  advantages  of  war  in  the 
trenches — after  a  hard  go  at  it,  a  man  has 
some  leisure  to  collect  his  thoughts.  It  is  no 
longer  what  it  was  in  the  days  of  the  Marne, 


THE  GLORY  GROWS  69 

when  one  marched  ahead  without  ever  a 
pause. 

And  certainly  Bourru's  mother,  back  in 
BHgny,  will  have  to  be  proud  of  her  son 
whenever  some  one  asks  her,  "And  have  you 
had  any  news  from  Louis?" 

She  has  only  to  show  the  letter  and  let 
them  see  for  themselves — Father  Chassagne, 
with  his  florid  Burgundy  face,  and  Gaffer 
Causeret,  always  so  solemn  with  his  ear- 
rings, and  old  "Pope,"  so  called  because  he 
was  once  a  soldier  of  the  Pope, — all  the  old 
fellows  will  see  what  the  young  man  can  do 
— and  the  girls  will  know,  too. 

"Dear  me!"  the  girls  will  say;  "did  you 
hear  that  Louis  Bourru  was  in  the  troop  that 
took  Vauquois?  Oh,  he's  a  wonder, 
Louis  .  .  ." 

Even  M.  Cyrot,  the  rich  merchant  of  the 
district,  will  ask  in  his  reserved  way,  "Won't 
you  please  let  me  see  your  boy's  letter, 
Madame  Bourru  ?  And  tell  him  we  think  he  is 
a  brave  boy  and  the  village  is  proud  of  him.'* 


70  BOURRU 

This  is  how  the  pride  of  heroism  finds  its 
way  into  the  soul  of  a  brave  man.  It  is  in 
meditating  on  what  others  think  about  us 
that  our  personahty  builds  itself  up.  Ac- 
cordingly as  we  fancy  that  others  are  prais- 
ing or  censoring  us  we  become  inflated 
heroes  or  pitiful  wretches. 

T^  T^  V  ^  ^^ 

You  cannot  imagine  how  wonderful  it  is 
to  take  your  ease  in  a  village  on  the  Meuse 
after  leading  a  dog's  life  for  a  while.  You 
look  on  at  the  life  of  civilization  with  new- 
born eyes — that  is,  at  houses  of  mud-plaster, 
at  agricultural  implements,  and  at  narrow- 
gauge  railway  ties.  At  Auzeville  there  are 
even  some  civilians  left,  and  you  say  to  your- 
self, "Heigh-ho!  I  came  pretty  near  never 
seeing  all  this  any  more !" 

The  streets  are  full  of  soldiers.  But  you 
are  not  to  imagine  that  any  foolish  gaiety 
reigns  here,  reaction  from  the  hours  of 
danger  just  past.  No,  it  is  still  too  early 
for  that.     The  soldiers  are  like  people  who 


THE  GLORY  GROWS  71 

have  got  wet  in  the  rain,  and  who  have 
reaehed  a  shelter  but  are  not  yet  dry. 
Moreover,  they  are  still  thinking  only  of 
themselves. 

"What  became  of  Terrier?"  one  man  is 
asking  of  a  comrade  from  the  company  next 
his  own. 

"Missing." 

"AndFanchois?" 

"Killed — right  next  to  the  church." 

"Oh!    Poor  fellow!" 

The  phrases  pretend  to  no  funeral  elo- 
quence, and  yet  when  they  report  the  death 
of  a  dear  friend  they  still  bring  a  shock  to 
the  nerves,  and  the  best  a  man  can  do  is 
stammer  out,  "Is  it  possible?  Is  it  pos- 
sible? .  .  .  What  \vi\\  his  poor  wife  do?" 

Then  the  men  talk  of  the  vicissitudes  of 
the  great  battle  they  have  just  lived  through. 
Violent  contradictions  have  already  devel- 
oped between  their  accounts  of  it. 

"And  what  do  you  think  Faraud  did? 
Absolutely  nothing,  I  tell  you — he  was  in 


72  BOURRU 

soft!  As  for  me,  I  kept  running  right  up 
to  the  top.'* 

"Bah,  what  are  you  talking  about?  The 
first  platoon  wasn't  in  it  at  all — it  was  my 
platoon  that  went  over  the  top  before  the 
whistle  blew,  and  the  proof  of  that  is  that  the 
270's  were  still  falling,  and  I  stopped  a  splin- 
ter from  one." 

"Oh,  thunder!"  protests  another.  "Cut 
out  the  fairy-tales.  It  wasn't  the  — th  com- 
pany that  got  there  first  from  the  east,  it 
was  our  own.  .  .  ." 

Thus  praise  and  blame  keep  increasing; 
and  the  men  go  on  disputing  about  the  parts 
played  by  the  various  battalions  and  regi- 
ments during  the  course  of  the  battle.  Each 
one  defends  the  honor  of  the  unit  to  which 
he  belongs.  The  "esprit"  of  each  platoon, 
each  company,  each  battalion,  each  regiment, 
grows  inflamed ;  and  to  the  end  of  time  there 
will  be  some  one  to  tell  you  that  such  and 
such  a  regiment  captured  Vauquois  all  alone. 
When  the  survivors  of  the  battle  are  dead 


THE  GLORY  GROWS  78 

the  "esprit"  of  the  troop  will  continue  to  in- 
spire their  sons  and  grandsons  and  great- 
grandsons — "It  is  a  worthy  pride  to  keep 
honor  ever  bright,"  as  said  an  author  of  the 
olden  time. 

In  the  afternoon  of  this  day  of  rest  a 
great  event  takes  place.  By  opening  a  news- 
paper every  soldier  can  read  the  official  ac- 
count of  the  taking  of  Vauquois,  together 
with  the  moving  comments  of  eloquent  jour- 
nalists.   It  is  his  first  document  of  the  kind. 

And  suddenly  Bourru  says  to  himself, 
"Say,  it's  really  true — we*ve  done  something 
stunning  1" 

The  account  is  read  and  reread,  with  re- 
ligious attention  to  each  word.  It  produces 
a  strange  state  of  mind — not  a  line  of  it  is 
doubted  for  a  moment ;  the  thing  is  in  print. 
It  is  as  if  the  events  of  the  day  just  past  had 
been  modelled  in  bronze;  they  stand  out  in 
clear  view  and  pass  into  history  as  incontest- 
able facts.  It  is,  indeed,  a  relief  to  read  the 
account,  for  now  one  can  know  how  to  tell 


74  BOURRU 

about  what  one  has  just  been  doing.  No  one 
of  these  soldiers,  in  the  absorption  of  his  own 
particular  piece  of  work,  has  seen  the  battle 
as  it  is  described  in  the  paper ;  but  no  matter, 
the  words  of  the  account  are  so  harmonious 
that  they  gain  immediate  adoption.  They 
will  furnish  the  proper  and  impressive  set 
phrases  that  one  will  need,  later  on,  for  de- 
scribing his  own  impressions,  and  they  will 
save  one  the  work  of  thinking  up  words  to 
express  vividly  what  one  has  seen  and  felt. 
A  little  later  and  the  real  impressions,  for 
lack  of  use,  will  fade  bit  by  bit  from  memory, 
and  pass  into  oblivion — and  in  their  places 
the  stereotyped  phrases  will  grow  more  and 
more  real  from  frequent  repetition,  and  a 
fictitious  picture  will  be  substituted  for  the 
true  one;  and  that  is  why  you  will  be  as- 
tonished to  hear  my  Bourrus  tell  about  the 
storming  of  Vauquois  in  great,  ponipous, 
and  impressive  words. 

Still,  if  the  newspaper  destroys  the  fresh- 
ness of  war-stories  on  the  one  hand,  it  does 


THE  GLORY  GROWS  75 

one  fine  piece  of  work  on  the  other.  Thanks 
to  it,  our  soldiers  begin  to  know  what  glory 
is.  The  paper  with  its  flaming  letters  passes 
from  hand  to  hand,  and  the  men  have  a  feel- 
ing that  they  are  in  the  center  of  an  aureole 
on  which  all  the  eyes  of  France  are  fixed. 
Wherever  they  may  go  from  now  on,  they 
can  say  proudly,  **I  have  just  come  from 
Vauquois." 

And  everybody  will  do  them  honor. 

L         «  *  ♦  Mtt  ♦ 

A  month  after  the  attack  an  officer  of  one 
of  the  regiments  engaged  in  it  happened  into 
the  buffet  of  a  little  railway  station  in  a  dis- 
tant province  and  heard  a  rather  tipsy  sol- 
dier cry  out  to  a  group  of  his  fellows: 

"I  tell  you  one  thing,  boys,  if  you  didn't 
see  Vauquois  you  don't  know  what  war  is!'* 

And  with  eyes  afire  and  his  cap  perched 
saucily  on  one  side  he  was  lording  it  over  the 
whole  assemblage.  Without  noticing  the 
uniform  he  even  jostled  the  officer  a  little 
upon  the  latter's  entrance.     But  of  a  sud- 


76  BOURRU 

den  he  caught,  inscribed  on  the  collar  of  the 
new  arrival,  the  number  of  a  regiment  that 
had  shared  the  glory  of  his  own;  his  eyes 
opened  wide  and  a  great  hoarse  cry  escaped 
him. 

"Hey,  you  blokes,  there's  a  man  from 
Vauquois,  like  me!  ...  A  brother  in 
arms.  .  .  .  You  can  ask  him  about  it,  if  you 
want  to.  Gee,  what  luck!  .  .  .  Come  on 
and  have  one  on  me,  captain,  you  can't  re- 
fuse a  fellow  that.  .  .  .  You've  got  to  tell 
'em  what  we  did  on  that  hill.  .  .  ." 

The  officer  simply  had  to  toe  the  rail  and 

take  his  tipple. 

*  *  *  *  * 

But  it  was  at  the  review  under  full  arms 
for  the  award  of  decorations  that  Bourru 
really  felt  himself  becoming  "somebody." 

You  know  what  a  review  is.  1  shall  not 
waste  time  describing  it  to  you,  for  it  takes 
place  at  the  front  with  the  same  ceremonies 
that  are  observed  on  the  fourteenth  of  July 
at  any  county-seat ;  only  there  is  still  a  little 


THE  GLORY  GROWS  77 

Vauquois  mud  on  the  men's  coats,  and  here 
and  there  some  blood-stains.  These  things 
are  more  moving  than  burnished  buttons,  I 
assure  you.  Moreover,  something  indefin- 
ably impressive  hovers  about  these  troops. 
Bourru  and  Iluguenin,  who  had  got  used  to 
having  Monier  between  them  in  the  line,  are 
side  by  side  now.  Their  missing  comrade 
remained  behind  on  the  hill.  ...  It  leaves 
a  queer  impression  not  to  feel  his  elbow  in 
dressing  the  line. 
It  is  with  their  faces  toward  the  tragic  hill, 
IHjbg  on  the  horizon,  that  the  troops  take 
position.  The  colonels  and  generals  seem  to 
speak  with  the  voice  of  eternal  France  when, 
between  two  blasts  from  the  bugle,  they  an- 
nounce in  resounding  words  the  merits  of 
those  whom  they  are  decorating.  All  the 
regiments  feel  as  one  in  this  day  of  glory. 

On  the  left  the  Argonne  unfolds  to  view 
its  sombre  hills,  over  which  hovers  a  light 
mist,  such  as  one  sees  rising  over  the  Alps 
in  the  panoramas  of  the  Italian  battles  at  the 


78  BOURRU 

palace  of  Versailles.  The  trees  on  the  hill 
of  Clermont,  forming  a  clear  line  against  the 
sky,  compose  a  hedge  of  horror.  On  the 
right  spreads  the  wide  expanse  of  the  Meuse 
country — valleys,  villages  hidden  among 
trees,  fields,  woods,  all  typifying  the  soil  of 
France  for  which  the  men  have  just  been 
fighting. 


VII 


HOLDING  THE  POSITION 


WHEN  Bourru  went  back  to  the  hill- 
top, after  fifteen  days  of  rest,  he 
found  certain  changes  in  the  posi- 
)ns.     In  the  midst  of  the  ruins  trenches 
>w  wound  their  way  through  the  hattle- 
Tcarred  ground — two  of  tlieni,  one  some  ten 
fifteen  yards  from  the  Bodies  and  the 
ler  some  fifty  yards  fartlier  back.     The 
jtical  problem  imposed  on  the  occupants 
simple  enough — ^to  stay  here  fifteen  days 
witliout  getting  hit.    They  apply  themselves 
it  with  all  their  skill.    I  do  not  remember 
lat  philosopher  it  was  who  said  that  man 
lessentially  a  constructive  animal.     If  the 
ilosopher  came  to  Vauquois  he  could  see 

79 


80  BOURRU 

his  theory  at  work.  The  trenches  are  a  veri- 
table museum  for  every  species  of  protec- 
tive device  that  man  can  invent.  Just  re- 
member that  the,  job  is  to  occupy  the  place 
in  the  pleasantest  way  compatible  with 
safety  from  trench-mortars.  Various  meth- 
ods of  procedure  are  in  vogue.  The  sim- 
plest consists  in  lying  flat  in  a  snug  wrapper 
of  tent-cover,  lolling  in  the  bottom  of  the 
trench.  This  is  the  method  of  the  more  lim- 
ited intelligences,  and  it  offers  a  thousand 
difficulties — everybody  jostles  you  and 
walks  over  you,  and  really  it  is  only  the  lazy 
beasts  that  follow  this  course;  and  it  is  no 
more  than  their  due  if  the  cooks,  stumbling 
over  them,  spill  the  contents  of  a  pail  on 
them. 

Why  don't  they  act  like  Bourru,  who,  with 
his  peasant's  wits,  at  once  examines  the  bit 
of  trench  that  has  fallen  to  his  lot  with  an 
eye  to  taking  full  advantage  of  its  features? 
He  soon  finds  a  plan.  For  here  in  the 
trench-wall  is  an  excavation  already  begun; 


■£ 

^v^ 


HOLDING  THE  POSITION  81 

you  need  only  dig  it  a  bit  wider  and  deeper, 
and  you  have  a  nice  little  niche  in  which  you 
can  stay  bundled  up  like  a  chrysalis  in  its 
cocoon.  It  is  not  at  all  bad  in  here,  with 
twenty  inches  of  earth  above  your  head  to 
protect  you  from  the  rain,  and  partially — oh, 
very  partially — from  the  trench-mortars. 
And  then,  above  all,  it's  a  "home." 

But  if  the  desire  for  luxury  possesses  you, 
d  it  seems  that  all  of  us  have  it  at  the  bot- 
of  our  hearts,  you  do  not  stop  witli  this, 
but  go  on  to  perfect  your  shelter.  First  you 
place  a  piece  of  tent-canvas  in  front  of  it — 
that  does  duty  for  a  door;  then  you  dig  your 
hole  larger,  for  in  the  long  run  nothing  is 
more  fatiguing  than  to  sit  forever  with  your 
in  on  your  knees.  A  few  hours  of  work 
and — what  luxury! — you  can  stretch  out 
your  legs.  But  this  love  of  comfort,  as  was 
long  ago  noted,  is  insatiable.  Before  you 
know  it  Bourru  is  off  through  the  connect- 
ing trench  to  look  for  planks  and  joists  in 
the  rubbish.    The  night  is  just  coming  down, 


82  BOURRU 

and  he  can  glide  in  and  out  among  the  ruins 
and  get  a  hundred  things  to  furnish  his  niche. 
He  makes  a  shelf  for  his  pipe,  and  the  artis- 
tic passion  awakening  in  its  turn,  he  is  al- 
ready sketching  ornamental  figures  on  his 
planks. 

But  wait  a  moment!  Already  you  are 
fancying  that  the  occupation  of  my  poilus  is 
limited  to  living  quietly  in  this  second-line 
trench.  Of  course,  this  is  where  they  eat  and 
sleep;  but  just  follow  me  along  this  connect- 
ing trench,  it  will  take  us  by  a  tortuous 
course  to  the  first-line  trench.  .  .  .  S-sh! 
Please  speak  very  low !  The  Boches  are  only 
fifteen  yards  or  so  distant,  you'll  give  your- 
self away.  This  is  where  the  men  stand 
guard,  guns  always  within  reach. 

At  the  time  of  which  we  speak,  the  adver- 
saries have  not  yet  got  accustomed  to  living 
within  a  few  yards  of  each  other.  Each  one 
keeps  imagining  that  the  other  is  going  to 
plunge  suddenly  upon  him.  Everybody  is 
suspicious,  so  much  so  that  half  the  troops 


HOLDING  THE  POSITION  83 

are  kept  constantly  in  the  first  line,  listening 
for  the  slightest  noise.  In  the  whole  assem- 
blage only  the  sentinels  are  standing,  behind 
a  wall  of  sand-bags  against  which,  from 
time  to  time,  bullets  are  slapping.  Through 
a  little  space  between  the  bags,  one  can 
watch  and  fire.  Those  who  are  not  on  the 
look-out  are  taking  shelter,  more  or  less, 
under  the  protection  of  boards. 

So  they  are  awaiting — what?  The  fire  of 
the  trench-mortars.  They  await  it  as  they 
might  a  phenomenon  of  nature;  the  bom- 
bardment is  coming  as  surely  as  rain  after 
fine  weather  or  winter  after  autumn.  What 
can  you  expect?  Men  who  hate  each  other 
with  a  deadly  hate  are  standing  here,  a  few 
yards  from  each  other.  They  have  at  their 
disposal  little  trench  cannon  that  slioot  a 
pound  or  so  of  melinite  for  a  few  hundred 
yards;  if  they  could,  they  would  be  flinging 
IHbibs  and  grenades  all  day  long.  But  there 
are  still  some  limits,  even  to  the  forces  of 
hate.    Unable  to  throw  their  projectiles  in- 


84.  BOURRU 

cessantly,  each  of  the  adversaries  watches 
for  the  favorable  moment  to  fling  them  for 
a  half -hour,  or  an  hour,  or  two.  The  mo- 
ment always  comes.  If  a  noise  reveals  the 
fact  that  the  soup  is  being  distributed,  the 
bombardment  begins;  if  a  sentinel  sneezes, 
the  grenades  begin  again;  and  if  there  is  no 
sign  to  give  information — well,  the  bom- 
bardment is  turned  loose  anyhow,  on  a 
chance,  on  the  second  line  as  well  as  the  first. 
You  live  in  anxious  expectation  of  this 
tragic  moment.  And  it  is  important  not  to 
lose  your  head,  as  you  are  going  to  see. 
Boom!  There  goes  a  shot.  Bourru  sees  a 
thing  like  a  great  sausage  rising  in  the  air, 
up,  up.  ...  It  is  a  shell.  Where  is  it  go- 
ing to?  Every  eye  is  fastened  on  it.  When 
it  reaches  the  top  of  its  flight  the  thing  seems 
to  hesitate  as  if  undecided  as  to  the  point  on 
which  it  will  be  pleased  to  fall.  Look  out  I 
It's  coming  at  us!  A  few  seconds  of 
alarm.  .  .  .  You  cannot  imagine  how  easy 
it  is  to  make  a  mistake  in  your  estimate  of  its 


HOLDING  THE  POSITION  85 

destination.  You  can  tell  at  once  whether  it 
is  coming  in  your  direction,  but  it  is  the  dis- 
tance that  is  hard  to  gauge. 

This  time,  for  instance,  all  the  poilus  of  the 
first  line,  in  trench  17,  thought  it  was  mak- 
ing for  them;  not  at  all,  it  was  the  second 
line  that  caught  it.  .  .  .  But  look  out,  here's 
another  one!  Give  way  to  the  right 
— quick  I  .  .  .  And  all  the  men  rush  to  the 
right. 

It  was  time.  .  .  .  Vrroom!  The  shell 
falls  at  the  point  they  have  just  de- 
serted. .  .  .  And  here's  another!  Run  to 
the  left!    Vrroom!    Another  close  shave.  .  .  . 

Look  out  there,  get  back — into  the  con- 
necting trench !  Holy  Moses,  some  fool  has 
got  himself  stuck  in  it,  and  stops  the  whole 
crowd!  The  men  cannot  get  by,  but  they 
have  time  to  throw  themselves  flat,  and  the 
splinters  fly  over  them,  hitting  nobody. 

So  it  goes  for  two  hours. 

What  a  session  to-day !  There  are  always 
three  or  four  shells  in  the  air  at  once,  and 


86  BOURRU 

you  never  know  which  one  to  keep  your  eyes 
on. 

Luckily  Bourru  has  not  lost  his  head.  He 
has  rallied  five  or  six  frantic  comrades  round 
him  and  is  on  the  look-out  for  them.  It  is 
he  who  orders  them  to  rush,  now  to  the  right 
and  now  to  the  left ;  but  the  thing  is  too  much 
for  them,  and  some  of  those  who  are  un- 
strung, instead  of  letting  a  cool-headed  man 
guide  them,  lift  their  heads  into  the  air,  hyp- 
notized by  the  shells.  They  stand  still,  with 
bulging  eyes,  and  watch  death  coming.  The 
sweat  runs  down  their  foreheads,  their 
mouths  hang  open,  and  their  motions  seem 
no  longer  to  obey  any  intelligence.  Judge 
for  yourself: 

"To  the  right!"  shouts  Bourru. 

Dufaut,  in  complete  frenzy,  starts  to  the 
right,  comes  back  to  the  left,  and  then  finally 
plunges  into  the  connecting  trench  in  the 
rear.  He  reaches  the  exact  point  where  the 
shell  falls,  and  it  explodes,  flinging  him  three 
yards  into  the  air. 


HOLDING  THE  POSITION  87 

As  for  Candec,  a  little  Breton  with  a  mys- 
tic countenance,  he  has  adopted  liis  usual  tac- 
tics in  case  of  hombardnient.  lie  has  placed 
himself  in  an  angle  of  the  connecting  trench, 
covered  his  head  with  tent-canvas,  and  thus, 
assured  he  will  see  nothing,  is  waiting  for 
destiny  to  decide.  You  can  hear  him  pray- 
ing out  loud:  "Dear  Jesus,  do  with  me  as 
you  will."  His  faith  is  effective,  for  he  has 
gone  through  five  or  six  homhardnit'iits  with- 
out a  scratch. 

the  second  line  there  are  two  theories 
available  as  to  the  best  manner  of  meeting  a 
bombardment  of  this  kind.  The  first  is  to 
run  hither  and  thither,  as  in  the  first  line; 
and  the  second  is  to  sit  tight  in  your  shelter 
and  say  over  and  over,  in  order  that  you  may 
believe  it:  "I've  got  half  a  yard  of  earth 
above  my  head,  and  tliat's  some  protection." 

Even  those  who  have  but  a  pitiful  plank 
to  protect  them  try  to  reassure  themselves: 
"I've  got  a  good  stout  plank,  and  it  will  take 
a  big  piece  of  shell  to  go  through  it." 


88  BOURRU 

But  whatever  certain  philosophers  may 
say,  an  idea  is  not  reality,  and  the  conviction 
that  you  are  protected  is  no  assurance  of 
protection.  From  time  to  time  you  hear 
cries — from  soldiers  struggling  in  a  cave-in. 

No  matter,  the  instinct  to  interpose  some- 
thing between  oneself  and  death  is  stronger 
than  all  the  lessons  of  experience.  In  the 
second  line,  as  soon  as  one  of  these  shells  ap- 
pears in  the  sky,  nearly  all  the  soldiers  are 
like  mice  looking  for  their  hole — not  any 
hole  whatever,  but  their  own  hole,  the  one 
that  they  have  prepared,  in  which  they  can 
be  much  safer  than  in  that  of  the  man  next 
them. 

That  is  why  Brimbeuf  will  not  pause  be- 
fore Bourru's  shelter,  although,  at  need, 
two  could  squeeze  into  it.  The  shells  are 
flying. 

"Come  on,  shove  in  here!"  cries  Bourru. 

But  Brimbeuf  doesn't  even  listen;  the  vis- 
ion of  his  own  hole  draws  him  irresistibly, 
like  a  scared  animal  that  always  runs  for  its 


HOLDING  THE  POSITIOxN  89 

lair.  If  only  he  can  get  to  his  own  pack,  his 
own  sack,  among  all  his  own  familiar  pos- 
sessions, he  will  he  saved.  A  bomb  rolls  up 
behind  him,  chasing  him  as  he  flies  down  the 
connecting  trenches,  and  suddenly  it  ex- 
plodes. .  .  .  One  man  more  will  fail  to  an- 
swer "present"  to-morrow. 

Where  is  the  heroism  in  all  this,  you  ask? 
While  death  is  raging  over  the  hill-top,  cast 
your  eye  upon  the  country  round.  Three 
hundred  yards  down  the  hillside  all  is  quiet. 
A  two-minute  dash  would  be  enough  to  get 
out  of  the  fatal  zone — and  it  would  be  so 
easy  running  down  hill.  But  not  a  man 
dreams  of  trying  it.  The  groups  of  frenzied 
soldiers  dash  from  right  to  left,  and  from 
left  to  right,  running  from  the  first  to  the 
second  line  and  back,  whirling  round — but 
they  stay  on  top.    That  is  their  heroism. 


VIII 
A  SINISTER  DUTY 

YOU  are  shuddering  already!  Before 
I  have  begun  you  have  guessed  my 
subject.  What  a  horror  the  idea  of 
a  corpse  rouses  in  our  souls!  The  authors 
of  the  old  military  regulations — all  of  two 
years  old — ^were  not  ignorant  of  it,  and  like 
skilful  psychologists  they  directed  that  the 
work  of  "sanitation"  on  the  battlefield 
should  be  done  by  special  troops.  A  wise 
precaution!  Thus  the  combatants  need  not 
know  the  horror  of  interring  their  compan- 
ions in  danger. 

Well,  that  horror  is  but  one  more  of  those 
which  our  soldiers  in  the  great  war  must 
master,  and  since  you  still  say  that  you  want 

90 


Jial 


A  SINISTER  DUTY  91 

to  learn  the  lessons  of  the  moral  school  of  our 
"admirable  poilus,"  I  am  obliged  to  show 
you  what  is  in  the  soul  of  Bourru  just  after 
he  is  detailed  for  "corpse  duty"  on  the  night 
t  is  coming. 

[Above  all  things,  do  not  expect  the  cold 
professional  indifference  of  an  attendant  in 
a  surgical  clinic.  Of  course,  Bourru  has  seen 
a  great  many  corpses,  but  he  has  preserved 
a  tender  and  sympathetic  soul  in  spite  of 
that.    For  instance,  he  has  never  passed  the 

|;rance  of  the  eastern  connecting-trench 
iiout  a  shudder.  .  .  . 
STou  must  know  that  the  uptorn  soil  has 
ver  been  cleared  round  the  position  cap- 
'ed  by  storm  two  weeks  ago.  There  is  no 
y  to  carry  off  the  soldiers  whose  course 
was  stopped  by  a  bullet.  Once  the  men  had 
pushed  their  attack  to  the  utmost  limit,  they 
had  to  dig  trenches  wherever  they  found 
themselves,  groping  in  the  dark,  witliout 
ing  a  noise,  stirring  the  least  that  was 
sible  in  order  noc  to  reveal  their  positions. 


92  BOURRU 

for  the  Boches  were  only  fifteen  yards 
away.  .  .  .  One  morning  it  was  discovered 
that  a  human  leg  was  sticking  out  of  a  para- 
pet that  had  just  been  thrown  up,  all  but 
barring  the  way  in  the  connecting-trench, 
with  the  rest  of  the  body  firmly  planted  in 
the  earth.  What  was  to  be  done?  Take 
away  the  entire  body?  That  would  have 
meant  tearing  down  two  yards  of  parapet, 
an  operation  that  would  be  dangerous.  Cut 
off  the  leg?  No — could  you?  So  they 
had  to  resign  themselves  to  rubbing  against 
the  thing  hanging  loose  from  the  wall  at 
the  entrance  to  the  eastern  connecting- 
trench.  .  .  . 

Ghastly!  Horrible!  Sickening!  You 
say.  .  .  .  On  the  contrary,  I  should  like  to 
lift  you  above  that  trite,  effeminate  horror  of 
a  corpse.  But  it  is  exceedingly  difficult  for 
me  to  explain  to  you  the  state  of  mind  of  the 
soldier  who  jostles  against  corpses  as  famil- 
iars and  who,  nevertheless,  preserves  a  re- 
ligious respect  for  them.    It  is  really  a  new 


I 


A  SINISTER  DUTY  93 

feeling,  born  of  the  war ;  and  when  the  psy- 
chologists come  to  write  their  subtle  histories 
of  the  soldiers*  souls  I  hope  they  will  not 
forget  to  explain  the  feelings  of  the  man 
who,  handling  the  body  of  a  companion  in 
arms,  says  to  himself:  "To-morrow  I  may  be 
where  he  is ;  I  must  bury  him  as  I  should  like 
to  be  buried." 

It  is  such  a  feeling,  dimly  realized,  that 
animates  "Rourru  when,  with  Cormier,  he  is 
preparing  to  leave  the  trench  and  explore  the 
ground  between  the  first  and  second  lines,  on 
which  the  combatants  have  fallen.  It  is  not 
possible  to  go  and  look  for  them  during 
the  day,  you  must  slip  out,  crawling,  at 
night;  and  above  all,  you  must  take  care 
not  to  stand  up — your  outline  would  be 
l^kn  against  the  sky  and  the  bullets  would 
whistle. 

The  thing  is  to  find  the  bodies.  Bourru 
and  Cormier  grope  through  the  debris  of 
wood  and  stone.  Their  hands  meet  a  thou- 
sand   strange    objects  .  .  .  suddenly    they 


94  BOURRU 

touch  something  soft  .  .  .  this  is  "one." 
The  first  movement  is  to  draw  back,  instinc- 
tively. After  this  moment,  if  you  would  ful- 
fil your  duty,  your  whole  being  must  strug- 
gle with  all  its  moral  strength  against  the 
horror ;  your  mind  must  control  your  senses 
fully  enough  for  the  touch  of  the  viscous  and 
the  smell  of  the  nauseous  to  be  transformed 
into  chastened  sensations.  What  a  miracle 
these  soldiers  perform!  Crushing  down 
their  revolting  sensations  by  the  exertion  of 
a  sublime  resolution,  these  rude  and  simple 
peasants  attain  that  lofty  state  of  mind 
which  animated  the  pious  buriers  of  an  older 
day.  The  mind  transfigures  the  repug- 
nant reality.  It  is  not  flesh  in  putrefac- 
tion that  they  are  dragging  over  the  stones, 
it  is  a  great  human  idea, — ^the  same  one 
that  makes  us  bow  respectfully  before  a 
coffin. 

"It's  all  in  the  day's  work,'*  says  Bourru. 
"But  a  corpse  is  a  heavy  thing — and  hard 
to  handle!    How  can  we  get  it  down  below? 


A  SINISTER  DUTY 


95 


There's  no  way  to  carry  it,  the  connecting 
trench  is  too  narrow.  We'll  have  to  keep  on 
dragging  it,  worse  luck!" 

They  make  their  way  down  hill  through 
the  twisting  trenches  whose  hollowed  walls 
serve  to  protect  the  soldiers.    In  passing  they 
wake  up  some  sleepers,  who  stretch  out  a 
ind  to  learn  what  is  ruhhing  against  them 
-and  draw  it  back  quickly. 
Then  they  nmst  begin  again.     They  re- 
in i  to  the  open  ground  and  search  anew. 
!his  time  they  find  several  bodies  together, 
;aped  in  a  hole.    Sliall  I  describe  the  scene 
you?     Yes,  I  must,  for  it  is  not  in  ab- 
-act  terms  that  I  can  convey  to  you  the  sol- 
r's  actual  state  of  mind,  at  once  mystic 
id  brutal,  which  you  wish  to  realize.    The 
•eat  difficulty  is  to  separate  the  corpses.    I 
lust  whisper  it  in  your  ear,  that  something 
profoundly  mysterious  takes  place  in  the 
ights  on  battlefields.     All  of  us  have  wit- 
jssed  it,  we  who  have  slept  and  dreamed  on 
lose  mortal  fields,  but  we  scarcely  dare  to 


96  BOURRU 

say  it,  so  strange  does  it  seem.  In  death,  the 
bodies  intertwine!  When  the  shells  have 
rent  the  pitiful  flesh,  all  those  who  lie  in  the 
same  hole  seem  to  draw  together,  to  cohere, 
and  to  mingle ;  and  the  weird  embracements 
take  place,  even  if  chance  has  placed  side  by 
side  the  bodies  of  enemies.  It  is  as  if  the 
souls,  before  quitting  the  bodies,  had  ef- 
fected a  final  reconciliation,  a  fusion  for  all 
eternity. 

So  you  understand  why  Bourru  is  forced 
to  pull  very  hard  on  the  single  arm  that 
emerges.  The  whole  heap  of  bodies  trembles 
as  he  pulls.  Imagine  a  man  tugging  with  all 
his  physical  force  at  an  arm;  think  also  of 
the  odor  of  coagulated  blood — ^how  your  fin- 
gers twitch  as  you  imagine  the  humid,  soft 
touch.  .  .  .  But  the  thing  must  be  done  I 
Here  we  are  not  dealing  with  the  fantasies 
of  lovers  of  the  Macaberesque  as  they  have 
been  shown  us  by  certain  degenerate  poets; 
we  are  not  shaking  up  the  dead  for  the  pleas- 
ure of  straining  our  nerves  with  new  sensa- 


I 
I 


r 


A  SINISTER  DUTY  97 

tions;  no,  it  is  sad  reality  that  is  imposed 
upon  us.  .  .  .  Come  on,  pull  at  this  arm! 
So  much  the  worse  if  it  comes  off  in  your 
hands ! 

And  if  you  do  not  understand  the  awful 
grandeur  of  your  deed,  it  is  because  you  have 
not  comprehended  all  that  is  meant  by  the 
word  Duty.  Bourru,  however,  knows  every- 
thing there  is  in  this  great  word.  I^istcn  to 
him  as  he  uses  it.    His  comrade  Cormier  has 

st  come  upon  the  head  of  one  soldier  in  the 
battered-in  breast  of  another.  Cormier  is  on 
the  point  of  fainting. 

*Bourru!    Bourru!    I'm  afraid  I'm  going 

keel  over !" 

"Brace  up,  old  chap,  brace  up!  It's  the 
duty." 

And  the  sublime  word  once  more  produces 
is  magical  effect.  .  .  .  You  can  see  them, 

n    you    not,    my    two    soldiers    working 

rough  the  silent  night  out  there  where 
death  is  stalking?  Around  them,  nothing 
ut  corpses ;  no  flag  unfurled,  no  bugle  blow- 


98  BOURRU 

ing,  not  even  a  human  voice,  nothing  at  all 
to  sustain  their  courage,  and  still  these  two 
poilus  of  mine  are  winning  the  hardest  strug- 
gle that  a  man  can  gain  over  himself,  they 
are  getting  the  best  of  a  horror  which  nature 
has  placed  deep  in  the  innermost  recesses  of 
our  souls. 

They  will  have  their  reward.  Never  will 
any  poet  be  impressed  as  they  are  with  the 
moving  fact  that  all  the  soil  trodden  under 
foot  of  man  is  made  of  the  ashes  of  the  dead ! 
O  Mother-land,  soil  of  our  fathers,  soil  of 
our  brothers,  too,  the  man  who  has  buried 
his  companions  in  arms  on  the  hill  knows 
what  tender  love  one  can  have  for  his  sa- 
cred land !  And  as  time  goes  by,  their  deeds 
of  horror  will  be  idealized;  the  two  soldiers 
will  remember  only  the  accomplishment  of 
a  holy  duty.  Death  in  her  fury  had  left  on 
the  hideous  soil  grinning  corpses  in  ignoble 
postures,  which  the  lieavens  themselves 
scarcely  dared  look  upon.  Bourru  and  his 
friend,  rude  but  respectful  pall-bearers,  were 


A  SINISTER  DUTY 


99 


the  workers  of  a  divine  harmony.  They  put 
the  bodies  of  their  comrades  back  into  the 
decent  posture  in  which  a  brave  man  may 
worthily  await  the  day  when  he  will  arise  to 
receive  his  eternal  reward. 


IX 

VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC 

INCESSANTLY  new  faces  appear 
among  Bourru's  comrades — for  death 
is  stalking  abroad  at  Vauquois.  At 
every  moment  arrive  reinforcements  from 
the  interior.  I  must  tell  you  of  the  state  of 
mind  of  these  new  combatants  on  their  ar- 
rival, for  they  compose  one  of  the  elements 
of  the  moral  atmosphere  in  which  Bourru 
passes  his  life. 

In  the  little  village  of  the  cantonment — 
far  back  in  the  interior — already  they  say 
merely  "up  there";  they  hardly  dare  pro- 
nounce the  word  "Vauquois,"  for  that  awak- 
ens visions  of  mystery,  of  grandeur  and  of 
terror.     Modesty   also   liinders   one   from 

100 


VAUQUOIS  THIP  TtlAXilC         '  idX 

speaking  too  much  of  it.  Do  you  not  lower 
your  voice  when  you  mention  the  cemetery 
where  your  clear  ones  are  sleeping?  For  ten 
months  the  regiment  has  been  battling  on 
that  hill  in  the  Argonne — and  how  many 
comrades  are  reposing  there  for  eternity! 

When  ''one  of  our  regiment"  comes  back 
from  "up  there" — veteran,  or  wounded,  or 
ill — a  halo  seems  to  shine  round  his  head. 
He  has  seen  VauquoisI  The  whole  town 
gathers  round  him,  and  he  tells  inexhaustible 
stories — magnificent,  trivial,  grandiose,  dis- 
astrous! So  many  times  is  the  tragic  hill  de- 
scribed that,  in  the  imagination  of  the  vil- 
lage, it  comes  to  seem  a  stupendous  moun- 
tain covered  with  the  smoke  of  bursting 
shells,  like  a  volcano  in  a  dream. 

It  takes  possession  of  the  people's  souls. 
The  territorials  think  of  it  witli  melanclioly 
resignation;  it  is  perhaps  tliither  that  des- 
tiny will  soon  lead  them  to  complete  their 
sacrifice.  For  the  young  soldiers  in  training 
Vauquois  is  a  marvellous  stimulant ;  it  is  that 


102  BOURRU 

which  makes  their  voices  so  clear  and  strong 
when  the  Marseillaise  bursts  forth  along  the 
march.  For  everyone  the  word  has  strange 
properties.  It  claws  and  tears  like  a  vul- 
ture; and  it  also  calls  up  I  know  not  what 
mocking  gesture  of  valor  in  the  face  of  death. 

The  day  comes  when  the  attraction  of  this 
magic  magnet  triumphs.  An  order  has  been 
given  by  the  general  staff — and  a  battalion 
has  left  for  Vauquois! 

What  excitement  in  the  farewells!  And 
what  long-drawn-out  shouts  of  glory  in  the 
wake  of  the  departing  train!  You  would 
think  that  all  France  would  be  stirred  by 
them.  The  peasants  look  upon  the  convoy 
with  the  astonished  eyes  that  one  sees,  in 
pious  pictures,  in  the  faces  of  those  who 
watch  one  of  the  elect  ascend  into  heaven. 

"Off  for  Vauquois!"  cry  the  young  men. 
"All  aboard  for 'up  there' I" 

"We  are  going  to  Vauquois,"  the  terri- 
torials confide  gravely  to  the  employees  at 
the  station. 


VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC  103 

And  everyone  trembles. 

No  one  approaches  the  hill  with  easy  fa- 
miliarity; as  if  one  were  about  to  draw  near 
to  a  goddess  enthroned  in  the  depths  of  some 
mysterious  temple,  there  must  be  an  initia- 
tion. One  must  make  himself  worthy  of  the 
terrible  kiss  she  will  accord  him. 

In  the  little  villages  beliind  the  ITnes  the 
young  soldiers  go  on  completing  their  train- 
ing. They  find  a  suitable  atmosphere  for 
it.  There  was  a  battle  here,  last  September, 
and  there  remain  prodigious  evidences  to 
speak  for  it — villages  burned,  forests  cut 
down  by  shell-fire,  graves  scattered  over  the 
plain. 

Often  one's  foot  strikes  a  fragment  of 
shell,  a  piece  of  old  clothing,  a  rifle.  The 
young  soldier  picks  up  the  rehc  and  exam- 
ines it — and  thinks.  Before  the  graves  he 
stands  for  long  moments  with  head  bowed 
and  with  mind  troubled. 

It  is  the  night,  above  all,  that  renders  him 
worthy  to  approach  the  sacred  hill. 


104  BOURRU 

When  the  weather  is  clear,  the  hill  is  vis- 
ible over  the  top  of  the  rising  ground  of  the 
Argonne.  A  little  to  the  left  the  sun  is  sink- 
ing in  the  blood  which,  for  months,  men  have 
been  casting  up  into  the  face  of  the  heavens. 
At  the  moment  when  it  is  about  to  disappear, 
Vauquois  stands  out  on  the  horizon,  in  white 
outline,  clear  and  vivid,  emerging  from  the 
somber  woods  a  tragic  vision. 

One  expected  to  see  a  dark  mass,  as  in 
mourning.  Unlike  all  the  other  billowy- 
waves  petrified  in  the  earth  of  the  Argonne, 
this  one  is  as  white  as  if  its  crest  were  still 
boiling  with  the  foam  of  a  terrible  tempest. 

Long  after  the  night  has  fallen  the  young 
neophyte  is  still  standing  on  his  eminence 
with  his  face  turned  toward  the  place  where 
the  white  apparition  vanished.  In  his  soul 
anguish  and  ambition  are  at  combat;  con- 
fusedly the  great  problems  of  life  ask  for  so- 
lution in  his  mind. 

A  day  comes  when  the  cannon  "up  there" 
rumble  louder  than  usual.    A  mute  anxiety 


VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC  105 

and  also  a  vague  hope  set  the  battalion 
aquiver.  What  is  happening?  Are  they 
going  to  send  us?  Suddenly  an  automobile 
arrives ;  an  officer  alights,  carrying  an  order. 
Everyone  understands  at  once:  we  are  off  I 
Tumult  and  shouting  ensue;  and  an  hour 
later  the  column^  moving  as  one  man,  fades 
beneath  the  northern  horizon.  Every  eye 
strains  toward  the  heights  behind  which 
stands  the  heroic  Hill;  and  every  mouth, 
with  an  indescribable  fervor,  utters: 

''La  liherte  guide  nos  pas!" 

Wliat  tranquillity  in  the  zone  immediately 
behind  the  line  of  fire!  All  appears  simple, 
well-ordered,  functioning  systematically. 
The  battalion  pauses  in  a  wood ;  for  the  mo- 
ment it  is  in  reserve.  Trenches  wind  their 
way  through  the  soil;  silently  the  men  slip 
into  them.  The  bullets  whistle  a  welcome 
over  their  heads. 

Here    the    young    soldiers    are    to    live 


106  BOURRU 

through  one  more  stage  of  training.  They 
look  through  the  loop-hole — Vauquois  is 
there,  quite  close  to  them.  Their  hearts  beat 
hard,  and  their  eyes  are  as  troubled  as  if  a 
radiance  shone  into  them  from  the  white 
crest. 

They  are  never  tired  of  standing  look-out. 
Never  has  there  been  a  grander  or  simpler 
spectacle.  The  whiteness  of  the  hill  is  ex- 
plained now ;  the  chalky  earth  has  been  torn 
from  its  depths;  for  ten  months  mines  have 
been  exploding  and  shells  bursting  in  this 
ground — a  tempest  of  steel  has  fallen, 
shattering  and  pulverizing  everything  in 
sight. 

Nothing  remains  of  the  village  but  frag- 
ments of  crushed  stone.  Not  a  tree,  not  a 
plant,  not  a  blade  of  grass,  nothing — abso- 
lutely nothing — remains  alive  on  that  height 
over  which,  at  this  moment,  hovers  the  silence 
of  death.  The  hill  looks  like  the  crumbled 
skeleton  of  some  gigantic  animal,  bleached 
by  the  desert  sun.     Nevertheless  we  know 


VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC  107 

that  in  the  bowels  of  the  hill  men  are  living 
and  keeping  guard.  .  .  . 

Suddenly  a  black  object  seems  to  spring 
out  of  the  earth,  mounts  into  the  sky,  slowly 
winds  down  again.  It  is  an  aerial  torpedo. 
As  it  touches  the  ground  there  bursts  a  ter- 
rific explosion,  an  enormous  cloud  rises  to 
heaven  .  .  .  and  weird  things  are  flung  into 
the  air. 

An  instant  later,  the  bombardment — a 
shower  of  shells — is  let  loose;  petards,  gren- 
bombs,  "turtles,"  "rat-tails,"  and  "va- 
ises' — everything  that  human  genius  has 
contrived  for  throwing  explosives  comes 
into  play.  The  earth  trembles  even  at 
our  distance,  and  the  hill  has  become  a 
volcano. 

Chunks  of  earth  fly  through  the  air. 
Black,  gray,  and  yellow  smoke-clouds  rise 
like  plumes  upon  the  height.  And  always 
ou  keep  seeing,  flung  into  the  air,  those 
d  things  that  represent  wreckage  of  all 
sorts — clothing,  kit-bags,  gabions,  and  per- 


mm- 

lises 


you 


108  BOURRU 

haps — human  limbs.  One  cannot  tell — from 
our  distance. 

Nearly  all  the  young  soldiers  are  looking 
on,  bewildered,  hypnotized.  The  sweat 
stands  out  in  beads  on  their  foreheads,  and 
they  are  trembling — in  admiration  or  in  ter- 
ror? Others  have  not  been  able  to  endure 
the  spectacle  of  horror ;  stricken  down  by  the 
goddess,  they  have  sunk  to  the  floor  of  the 
trench  and  are  scratching  mechanically  at 
the  ground. 

During  the  night  a  mysterious  process 
takes  place  in  their  minds.  Face  to  face  with 
the  hill  of  death,  which  now  stands  out  in 
somber  profile  against  the  sky,  every  man 
looks  down  once  more  into  the  depths  of  his 
soul.  First  comes  temptation,  with  its 
prayer  of  anguish — let  this  cup  of  bitterness 
pass  from  me. 

Then  grace  steals  softly  into  the  heart  and 
fills  it  .  .  .  and  the  spirit  yields  submission 
to  the  sacred  cross.  The  life  of  the  individ- 
ual may  be  only  an  illusion — what  does  it 


VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC  109 

weigh  in  the  scales  against  the  great  social 
ideas  that  make  for  all  that  is  noble  in  man- 
kind— against  the  idea  of  native  land,  of 
justice,  of  freedom?  What  matters  it  to 
have  been  no  more  than  a  fugitive  gleam  in 
the  world,  a  will-o'-the-wisp  flaring  for  an 
instant  out  of  the  night  of  eternitj^?  If  my 
sacrifice  be  made  with  a  good  will,  may  I  not 
repeat,  I  also,  the  ancient  words : 

*'0  death,  where  is  thy  sting?  O  grave, 
where  is  thy  victory?" 

Sharp  sensations  run  along  the  nen^es. 
•  .  .  Perhaps  it  is  the  cold? 

The  morning  liglit  steals  across  the  sky, 
slowly  at  first,  then  all  at  once  bursts  into 
brilliance.  ^Vith  it  is  born  an  unconquerable 
hope  for  a  radiant  future — the  others,  per- 
haps, will  be  hit,  but  I  shall  escape.  .  .  . 
Something  whispers  this  in  every  ear. 

A  general  passes — square-shouldered, 
thick-set,  with  a  countenance  at  once  smiling 
and  calm;  the  tuft  on  his  chin  accentuates 
his  expression  of  firm  will.    Passing  the  new 


110  BOURRU 

soldiers,  whose  faces  are  a  little  pale,  he  says 
a  few  words  of  affectionate  pleasantry,  and 
immediately  cheeks  regain  their  color  and 
shoulders  straighten  in  confidence.  Vau- 
quois  is  funereal  no  longer. 

A  light  mist  envelopes  the  hill,  so  that  it 
resembles  some  precious  relic  protected  in 
thin  gauze.  All  is  quiet.  The  moment 
seems  like  a  solemn  pause  in  a  religious  cere- 
mony. The  young  soldier  may  now  climb 
"up  there"  to  win  his  spurs  of  knighthood. 

Here  we  are,  then,  in  the  interminable 
maze  of  trenches  leading  up  to  Vauquois. 
There  is  a  moment,  in  passing,  for  a  glance 
at  the  historic  heights  of  Mamelon  Blanc,  of 
the  Bois-Noir,  of  the  Cigaleric;  then  the  as- 
cent begins.  The  balls,  passing  overhead, 
emit  a  sharp  cry  like  that  of  angry  little  ani- 
mals. 

In  the  connecting-trench  are  men  lying 
down,  some  of  them  sleeping,  others  busy 
over  trivial  tasks.  We  can  ask  them  ques- 
tions familiarly.    For  several  days  they  have 


o 

shoe 


VAUQUOIS  THE  TRAGIC  111 

been  living  under  the  momentary  threat  of 
death,  and  we  might  expect  impatient  rephes 
from  them  or  even  a  certain  dismal  anguish. 
Not  at  all !  They  are  merry.  But  it  is  by  no 
means  the  rough,  untutored  merriment  of 
hours  of  leisure ;  it  is  rather  a  kind  of  buoy- 
ancy of  the  spirit,  in  which  one  senses  a 
noble  pride,  a  thoughtful  serenity,  and,  at 
bottom,  even  a  certain  gaiety. 

On  every  side  the  soil,  torn  to  pieces,  is 

sheer  chaos  of  amazing  objects.  One 
ht  think  an  earthquake  had  just  sent  its 
snock  through  the  hill. 

"It's  nothing  but  a  yard  for  wreckage," 
says  Sergeant  Fougeres, — "or  maybe  for 
building." 

Pregnant  words!  It  is,  indeed,  a  work- 
yard,  this,  on  a  vast  scale.  For  materials, 
it  uses  men,  corpses,  earth,  guns,  shells;  and 
its  work  is,  first  of  all,  demolition — that  of 
the  spirit  of  savagery — and  then  construc- 
tion— ^that  of  the  France  of  to-morrow. 

I  can  understand  now  the  peculiar  gaiety 


112  BOURRU 

of  the  men  who  live  here;  it  is  the  pride  of 
being  toilers  in  a  vast  task.  So  must  the 
happy  masons  have  worked  on  the  splendid 
cathedrals  of  the  Middle  Ages. 

The  mysterious  virtue  of  this  hill  is  that  it 
awakens  unknown  forces  in  the  soul  of 
everyone  who  sets  foot  on  it.  .  .  .  Before 
coming  here  he  used  to  be  tormented  by  the 
thought  that  dishonorable  fear  might  over- 
come him  when  he  should  arrive  "up  there!'* 

But  a  miracle  has  happened.  All  notion 
of  dismay  has  taken  flight.  Every  man  can 
feel  expanding  within  him  an  inspiration  of 
unusual  vigor,  which  in  the  days  to  come — 
as  with  the  old  sailor  who  regrets  the  storms 
he  can  no  longer  breast — he  will  look  back 
upon  with  a  proud  feeling  of  melancholy. 
Even  if  death  must  take  him,  the  young  war- 
rior has  now  come  to  know  that  he  has  lived 
through  the  sacred  moment  in  which,  with  a 
single  thrill,  the  soul  is  filled  with  a  richer 
life  than  any  offered  by  a  whole  century  of 
paltry  and  tedious  incidents. 


A  HAND-GRENADE  BATTLE 


mat 


WHEN  the  others  said,  "Well,  we're 
^oin^  on  up,  eh?"  Bourru  would 
re})ly  with  a  slip^ht  air  of  presump- 
tion, ''Sure  thin^!    One  of  these  days '' 

But  that  was  pure  hoastin^.  Deep  in  his 
heart  Bourru  felt  sure  that  it  was  silly  to 
t  out  of  one  trench  only  to  ^o  and  di^  an- 
er  one  twenty  yards  higher  up,  ri^ht  at 
the  top  of  the  peak.  Of  course,  from  this 
new  site  they  would  he  ahle  to  command  the 
Boche  positions;  but  hadn't  they  already 
tried  several  times  to  get  to  the  top,  and 
didn't  they  have  to  come  down  again  leaving 
their  dead  on  the  ground?  No,  honestly,  it, 
better  for  the  French  and  the  Boches  to 

113 


114  BOURRU 

stay  where  they  were,  each  on  his  own  side 
of  the  hill-top. 

But  in  the  squad  there  are  four  or  five 
"rookies"  who  will  not  stay  in  their  places 
and  are  always  up  to  some  trick  or  other. 
You  can  hear  Aubouin  declaring,  "Hang 
the  Boches!  If  they  once  saw  us  up  tliere, 
they'd  beat  it  like  scared  rabbits!"  And 
here  is  Tschieret  in  his  defiant  mood — 
"Give  me  three  good  fellows  to  follow  me 
and  we'll  take  the  top."  And  all  the  rest 
try  to  crow  a  little  louder. 

So  they  have  been  crowing  for  a  week. 
Oh,  the  good  mothers  who  keep  writing  to 
their  boys,  "Above  all,  don't  do  anything 
imprudent,"  have  no  idea  how  difficult  the 
life  of  a  prudent  man  is.  Of  course  you 
understand  too  that  Bourru  is  not  going  to 
give  up  his  place  in  the  expedition — Bourru, 
to  whom  the  general  said  one  day,  while 
decorating  him,  "Aha !  So  you're  from  Bur- 
gundy, my  good  fellow!  So  am  I.  The 
fellows  from  our  part  of  the  country  don't 


kn 


A  HAND-GRENADE   BATTLE       115 

ow  what  fear  is,  eh  ?"  At  that  solemn  mo- 
ment,— while  the  general  was  twisting  the 
pepper-and-salt  tuft  on  his  chin, — Bourru 
had  decided  that  he  would  be  brave  to  the 
end  of  his  days. 

That  is  why  our  soldier  and  his  comrades 
are  all  busy  digging  a  trench  up  on  top  to- 
night. .  .  .  Yes,  they  have  "gone  up" — 
and,  what  is  more,  without  orders.  It  wasn*t 
hard  to  do — the  Boche  sentinel  must  have 
been  sleeping,  and  no  star-shell  disclosed 
them  at  their  work.  All  the  while  they  are 
digging,  the  "rookies"  are  laughing  to  them- 
selves. 

■  "Aha  I  Maybe  the  boys  in  the  regiment 
won*t  open  their  eyes  to-morrow.  .  .  .  And 
the  captain,  too !  .  .  .  And  the  major!  .  .  . 
And  the  colonel !" 

As  for  Bourru,  he  has  just  one  thing  on 
mind — "If  only  we  can  get  a  hole  dug 

fore  the  grenades  come!" 

But  if  there  is  a  providence  for  drunk- 

ds  there  is  another  for  dare-devils.     Not 


116  BOURRU 

a  sound  comes  from  the  direction  of  the 
Boches.  What  luck !  The  picks  cut  rapidly 
into  a  soil  torn  to  pieces  during  previous 
attacks  and  never  "tidied  up."  Hello, 
here's  an  old  platter — a  rusty  gun — an  over- 
coat. .  .  .  Suddenly  Bourru's  pick  rebounds 
as  if  it  had  struck  something  elastic.  "I 
thought  so,"  mutters  Bourru;  "it's  a  corpse 
from  three  weeks  ago.  .  .  .  All  right,  old 
fellow,  I'm  not  going  to  disturb  you!"  And 
he  digs  a  little  to  one  side,  so  as  to  leave  the 
body  on  the  parapet — that's  the  best  place 
for  it! 

Bang!  Zing!  Bing!  Boom!  Grenades 
begin  to  fall  only  a  few  paces  from  the  work- 
ers. They  thought  they  were  concealed;  not 
a  bit  of  it !  The  whole  heaven  can  see  them 
and  spit  bombs  in  their  faces.  That  is  the 
feeling  you  have  when  treacherous  hatred, 
lying  in  wait,  suddenly  catches  you. 

The  rookies  have  thrown  themselves  on 
the  ground.  If  you  could  look  into  their 
hearts  you  would  see  that  fear  has  sub- 


I 


A  HAND-GRENADE  BATTLE       117 

merged  them  at  one  stroke,  as  a  wave  breaks 
over  an  unsuspecting  bather  when  the  sea 
grows  suddenly  angry.  All  thought  is 
drowned  under  the  shock,  and  the  soul  is 
blinded,  but  the  physical  man  seeks  to  de- 
fend himself  and  rises  to  flee. 

A  shadowy  form  has  risen  on  the  hill-top. 
Before  it  can  plunge  to  the  rear  Bourru  has 
seized  the  coat  of  the  frantic  soldier  who  is 
making  for  safety. 

"Hey!    Where  are  you  running  off  to?" 

"I — I — I  forgot  my  canteen!" 
^"I'll  lend  you  mine.     Great  Scott,  can't 
^Bu  see  that  the  Boches  are  missing  us?" 

It  is  true.  In  their  ignorance  of  the  exact 
location  of  the  noise  that  alarmed  them,  the 
Germans  are  dropping  their  grenades  short 
of  the  mark,  and  the  bombs  go  rolling  down 
hill.  Yes,  but  when  daylight  comes,  the 
Boches  will  see  where  to  aim.  .  .  .  The  dig- 
ging goes  on  furiously,  for  every  man  feels 
that,  a  little  later,  his  life  will  depend  on 
the  depth  of  his  hole. 


118  BOURRU 

The  day  dawns.  Our  men  command  the 
whole  valley,  rosy  in  the  sunlight,  as  well 
as  the  enemy  trench,  twenty  paces  dis- 
tant. 

"And  now  it's  going  to  rain  steel,*'  thinks 
Bourru.  Sure  enough,  the  German  gren- 
ades fall  closer  by. 

Had  we  better  reply  to  the  Boches? 
That's  the  problem.  Under  our  projec- 
tiles perhaps  they  would  keep  quiet,  over- 
whelmed. But  perhaps  it  would  only  enrage 
them  to  a  fury  to  say  the  last  word.  And 
they  have  better  stores  than  we  have,  because 
they  are  in  their  trenches,  whereas  once  our 
sacks  are  emptied  it  will  be  hard  to  get  more 
grenades.  Also,  if  we  stir  round,  we  shall 
give  away  the  position  of  our  defences,  which 
are  still  weak  enough.  ...  So  the  soldiers 
on  the  hill-top  are  as  perplexed  as  a  man 
caught  in  a  swarm  of  wasps,  who  stands 
stock-still  and  thinks,  "I'd  better  not  stir 
them  up!" 

It  is  finally  decided — they  will  lie  low. 


A  HAND-GRENADE   BATTLE       119 


ttt    LI 


But  it  is  no  easy  thing  to  stay  quiet  and  mo- 
tionless when  at  any  minute  a  grenade  may 
come  down  on  your  head.  Your  perspira- 
tion runs  as  fast  as  if  you  were  chopping 
wood  under  a  midday  sun. 

"Oh,  confound  it,  this  is  too  slow,  sitting 
here  and  doing  nothing!'* 

Bourru  has  seized  a  grenade.  Snap!  lie 
strikes  the  cap  on  the  palm  of  his  hand  and 
with  his  good  right  arm  he  liurls  tlic  thing 
at  the  Boches.  .  .  . 

nd   then   everything   hegins   crackling, 
whistling,  smoking,  exploding.  .  .  . 

A  Boche  head  appears,  sticking  out  from 
trench : 

*  Your  turn,  there,  get  him  I  .  .  .    No,  no, 
my  turn !" 

"ni  get  him!  .  .  .    ni  get  him!..." 

The  men's  arms  are  busy  whipping  the 
grenades  through  the  air.  From  time  to 
time  they  fling  themselves  flat,  or  take  each 
other's  places.  The  Boches  answer  with  a 
will. 


120  BOURRU 

"Hey,  old  man!  Slip  me  one  of  your 
grenades." 

"Here,  take  'em  all.  They've  winged  me. 
I'm  out  of  it." 

Everything  smells  of  smoke — a  smoke 
that  gives  you  a  fever  and  scrapes  in  your 
throat. 

"Look  out,  Jolly!  Behind  your  feet — 
pick  it  up!" 

It  was  time.  The  fuse  of  the  grenade, 
just  at  the  man's  feet,  was  burning  close. 
It  is  deftly  lifted  and  goes  flying  back  at 
the  enemy.  What  a  fellow  this  Jolly  is! 
He  has  installed  a  box  of  grenades  at  his 
side,  of  old  ones — ^the  1914  model,  corru- 
gated. He  has  hung  a  dozen  of  them  on  his 
gun  by  leather  thongs.  It  is  like  a  bunch 
of  grapes — or  of  those  real  "grenades,"  the 
pomegranates  that  come  from  Africa  and 
are  on  sale  in  the  fruit-stalls.  Everj''  so 
often  he  grasps  one,  plucks  it — and  bang! 
one  more  corrugated  present  has  gone  to  the 
Boches,  only  to  fly  to  pieces  on  arriving. 


A  HAND-GRENADE  BATTLE       121 

Spat!  .  .  .  Spat!  Two  more  German 
bombs  have  just  fallen  at  Jolly's  feet.  One 
of  them  is  quickly  flung  back,  the  other  is 
about  to  follow;  he  is  just  on  the  point  of 
hurling  it,  when — Bang! — the  thing  ex- 
plodes. .  .  .     Jolly's  hand  has  vanished  in 

the  smoke. 

IHk  *  *  m  lit 

'*Ah,  here  you  are,  stretcher-bearers! 
id  it's  none  too  soon.  Here,  take  along 
Ily,  and  on  the  way  down  tell  them  to 
id  us  up  some  grenades." 
'*I'll  go  and  get  'em  myself,"  says  a  young 
low  who  is  trembling  a  little. 
"No,  no,  my  boy,  stay  where  you  are. 
They're  going  to  serve  'em  up  to  us,  like 
princes." 

"Look  here,  Bourru,  this  is  getting  hot. 
Do  you  think  we  can  hold  out  heie 
long?" 

Until  the  peace  treaty,  tenderfoot  I  Here 
are,  and  here  we  stay.  Come  on,  blaze 
y  and  forget  it!" 


122  BOURRU 

"Ah,  bully!  Here  comes  Grossou  crawl- 
ing up  with  a  sackful  of  grenades." 

"That's  not  the  way,  boys,"  Bourru  is 
saying.  "We've  got  to  give  'em  a  volley, 
all  together,  to  make  'em  shut  up." 

So  the  men  practice  a  simultaneous  fusil- 
lade to  demoralize  the  enemy  by  heaping 
fire  on  him  all  along  the  line  at  once. 

Bang!  Bang!  Bang!  That  was  the  first 
shower.  .  .  .  By  the  fifth,  complete  silence 
has  settled  down  over  the  Boches.  ...  It  is 
only  seven  in  the  morning,  and  the  exchange 
of  grenades  has  not  lasted  more  than  twenty 
minutes. 

"Ah!  The  gentlemen  won't  play  any 
more,"  says  Lachard.     "What  a  pity." 

The  younger  fellows  laugh  in  a  nervous 
way.  Their  effort  has  been  so  tremendous, 
as  it  seems  to  them,  that  surely  nothing  can 
be  left  for  the  neighboring  troops  to  do. 
The  war  is  over,  quite  over.  .  .  .  One  of 
them  timidly  proposes: 

"Now  that  we've  shown  the  Boches  that 


A  HAND-GRENADE   BATTLE        123 

we've  got  their  number,  we  might  as  well 
clear  out  ...  it  might  be  more  prudent.'* 
"Not  on  your  life,"  says  Bourru;  "you 
wanted  to  come  here,  and  here  you  stayl" 


XI 

THE    CELLAR   OF    THE 
ENGINEERS 

THIS  is  the  picture  that  Bourru  pre- 
serves of  the  place.  There  is  a 
good,  strong  cellar,  left  from  one 
of  the  houses  of  the  village,  and  above  it  so 
much  rubbish  lies  heaped  up  as  to  form  a 
stout  protection  against  shells;  that  is  why 
the  engineers  put  their  explosives  here.  The 
place  will  hold  out  against  bombardment  for 
two  good  months.  When  an  attack  is  on  and 
you  are  in  reserve,  you  stop  here  and  await 
your  turn  to  go  into  action.  A  first-aid  sta- 
tion has  been  established  in  one  corner.  You 
can  look  at  the  wounded  before  you  depart 
to  fight  at  the  very  place  where  these  agon- 

124 


HE  CELLAR  OF  THE  ENGINEERS    125 

ized  men  received  the  kiss  of  death.  What 
else  is  there  to  do?  This  is  the  only  cellar 
up  here  where  you  can  be  safe,  and  it  must 
be  used  for  all  it  is  worth.  Outside  the  shells 
are  bursting,  the  earth  is  trembling.  .  .  . 

Bourru  is  not  thinking ;  his  mind  is  merely 
crowded  with  pictures.  Some  one  is  bring- 
ing in  a  wounded  man. 

"He  was  hit  in  the  abdomen,''  says  the 
stretcher-bearer. 

The  man  is  groaning  and  uttering  little 
jH^s;  they  undress  him,  and  find  his  abdo- 
men so  covered  with  blood  that  they  have  to 
search  for  the  wound.  Ah,  here  it  is!  Com- 
presses are  gently  applied,  and  the  wounded 
man  is  left  alone.  He  still  groans,  but  very 
^HD  the  little  cries  begin  to  grow  fainter — 
as  if  a  singer  were  descending  the  scale.  By 
the  gleam  of  the  candle  you  see  him  grow 
paler,  still  paler  .  .  .  and  soon  he  ceases  to 
groan.  A  stretcher-bearer  lifts  up  his 
hand  and  it  falls  back,  inert.  "He  is  dead," 
e   word;   "put   him   into   a   tent-cloth 


126  BOURRU 

.  .  .  we'll  take  him  down  to-night  or  to- 
morrow." 

Nearby  they  are  undressing  another 
wounded  man.  A  piece  of  shell  has  torn 
through  his  buttock — the  wound  looks  like 
a  monstrous  mouth  with  great,  red,  bleeding 
lips. 

Farther  on,  an  attendant  is  searching  the 
dead,  collecting  their  purses,  their  notebooks, 
and  other  possessions,  and  making  a  rapid 
inventory  of  the  relics.  In  his  hand  you  can 
see  photographs,  locks  of  hair,  letters.  .  .  . 

"Turn  me  loose,  turn  me  loose!"  cries  a 
soldier  whom  they  are  bringing  in.  "I  want 
to  go  back  there.  .  .  .  Ah,  the  dirty  Boches. 
They  sha'n't  say  they  got  me!" 

And  through  the  blood  that  covers  his 
face  two  eyes  glare  with  passion. 

"Ah,  old  chap  I"  another  is  saying,  "it's  the 
devil's  own  luck.  We'd  been  in  that  hole  for 
two  hours.  There  was  a  wall  in  front,  and 
I  was  sure  the  Boches  were  all  gone.  Bang! 
Just  like  that  I  felt  a  hand  come  down  on 


THE  CELLAR  OF  THE  ENGINEERS    127 

my  shoulder — I  honestly  thought  it  was 
Mazel  hitting  me.  I  can't  see  where  it  could 
have  come  from,  that  bullet." 

"Oh,  say  now!"  cries  a  stretcher-bearer  to 
a  wounded  man  who  is  yelling:  "don't  roar 
like  that;  you've  only  got  a  scratch,  you 
lucky  dog!  You'll  get  three  months  on  the 
Cote  d'Azur  between  white  sheets." 

Here  is  young  Dr.  Bon  jean,  adored  by  all 
the  troopers  for  his  courage  and  devotion. 
A  week  ago  he  received  the  cross  of  the  Le- 
gion of  Honor  that  he  so  well  deserved. 
They  bring  in  a  man  whose  leg  is  so  shat- 
tered that  it  holds  only  by  a  few  shreds  of 
flesh.  The  physician  is  going  about  his  duty 
of  completing  the  amputation,  when  sud- 
denly the  wounded  man  awakens  from  his 
coma,  opens  his  eyes,  and  sees  the  bright  new 
ribbon  on  the  doctor's  breast. 

j"Ah,  my  dear  major!"  he  says  with  his 
ik  voice,  "I  have  been  wanting  to  con- 
gratulate you — allow  me  to  make  use  of  this 
occasion.  .  .  ." 


128  BOURRU 

"No!  No!"  another  man  is  howling, 
"I  don't  want  to  die.  Mother!  Help! 
Mother!" 

JNlany  of  the  wounded  say  nothing  at  all. 

"This  is  awfully  slow — awfully!"  mur- 
murs Bourru.    "I'd  like  to  get  out  of  here!" 

But  not  all  the  soldiers  agree  with  him; 
everybody  knows  that  this  cellar  of  the  en- 
gineers is  a  very  safe  place  in  case  of  bom- 
bardment. As  soon  as  the  bombing  begins 
one  feels  himself  irresistibly  drawn  to  it. 
Ah,  if  only  one  could  plunge  into  it  when- 
ever a  volley  of  explosives  is  falling  in  his 
tracks — what  relief !  The  memory  you  carry 
of  this  cave  haunts  you  like  a  past  joy. 

Things  are  pretty  hot  outside  to-day,  and 
several  men  have  made  their  way  to  the  door 
of  the  cellar,  but  great  heavens!  you  can't 
let  everybody  in  here.  A  petty  officer  of  the 
engineers  cries  out: 

"Get  out  of  here,  damn  you!" 

"Let  me  in,  just  a  minute,"  says  the  feeb- 
lest of  them. 


THE  CELLAR  OF  THE  ENGINEERS   129 

Sometimes  the  voice  is  so  pitiful  that  tlie 
sergeant  lets  the  frantic  man  enter  for  a  few 
minutes.  The  man  will  stand  still,  breath- 
less, shivering,  silent.  He  looks  at  the  group 
of  the  wounded  in  the  candle-light  toward 
the  rear  of  the  cellar. 

You  do  not  know  what  he  is  thinking. 
For  that  matter  no  one  does  think,  in  this 
cave  of  the  engineers;  one  waits,  one  suf- 
fers, and  one  fills  his  ears  with  cries  and  his 
with  sights  which  at  a  later  day  may  be 
isformed  into  thoughts. 


XII 
SHIFT  FOLLOWS  SHIFT 

I  MIGHT  continue  to  show  you  Bourru 
pursuing  the  humbler  tasks  of  his  Hfe 
from  day  to  day,  and  let  you  follow  my 
man  through  his  monotonous  work  as  a  sol- 
dier of  the  trenches.  Days  "in  the  line"  suc- 
ceed interminably  upon  days  of  "rest":  two 
weeks  on  the  hill  and  two  in  the  cantonment 
— and  so  on  forever.  All  that  would  be  very 
uninteresting  to  you,  so  I  prefer  to  paint  in 
rapid  strokes. 

The  shifts  that  follow  on  each  other's  heels 
make  clean-cut  divisions  in  the  soldier's  life. 
Regiments  work  in  relays  like  the  bands  of 
laborers  who  dig  in  subway  tunnels,  and  one 
comes  to  count  time  only  in  terms  of  shifts. 

130 


SHIFT   FOLLOWS   SHIFT  131 

No  one  says  "last  month"  or  "next  week"; 
the  word  "shift"  has  replaced  all  the  terms 
for  periods  of  time  that  are  in  usage  in  civil- 
ian language. 

Hi'he  very  work  of  the  comhatants  feels  the 
influence  of  this  stagnation;  it  is  governed 
by  administration,  by  a  bureaucracy.  Ev- 
erything is  planned  out,  organized.  Oh! 
that  somber  word  "organization,"  that  is  the 
word  that  the  Boches  intone  with  so  much 
^Kde — telling  us  that  tlieir  civilization  has 
achieved  the  last  word  in  organization;  and 

■order  to  beat  them,  we  have  had  to  follow 
pi  into  this  field.    But  at  what  loss!    War 
I  lost  that  romantic  aureole,  that  allure- 
pt  of  the  unforeseen  which  made  it  so  in- 
vesting when  we  used  to  read  of  it  in  the 
imoirs  of  soldiers  of  an  older  day.     Gone 
^^  is  the  gay  humor  of  hussars  on  a  tourney  in 
^H^B  fields  where  were  a  thousand  opportuni- 
^H^B  for  laughter  or  for  fighting.    Day  after 
oay  Bourru  goes  into  battle  as  he  might  to 
actory,  from  a  given  hour  to  a  given  hour, 


132  BOURRU 

and  when  he  is  not  in  the  trenches,  some- 
thing extraordinary  indeed  would  be  neces- 
sary to  rouse  his  interest. 

At  the  cantonment,  during  a  period  of 
rest,  the  troops  fall  back  into  the  life  of  the 
garrison — daily  exercise,  reviews,  tiresome 
routine. 

In  the  trench,  the  battalions  alternate  in 
the  various  positions,  now  at  Vauquois  itself, 
on  the  east  or  on  the  west,  and  now  in  the 
second-line  positions,  at  Bois  Noir,  or  la 
Maize,  or  Allieux.  Each  battalion  takes  its 
turn  at  each  place. 

A  favorite  kind  of  conversation  is  the  de- 
bate as  to  whether  your  troop  is  not  doing 
more  work  than  some  other  one.  It  is  a  re- 
markable thing,  but  if  you  interrogate  the 
men  of  the  — th  regiment,  they  will  prove  to 
you  that  their  regiment  is  always  "sacrificed" 
— that  is  to  say,  it  does  from  twelve  to 
twenty-four  hours  more  trench  duty  on  each 
trip  than  does  its  neighboring  regiment. 
"Ah!  those  fellows  in  the  — th,"  declare  the 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS  SHIFT 


133 


gea 

■I 


poilus,  "they  are  lucky  dogs ;  they  must  have 
a  pull — they  never  do  more  than  two  weeks 
in  the  line,  and  we  stay  there  fifteen  days — 
even  sixteen!" 

But  if  you  go  and  open  an  investigation 
in  the  privileged  regiment,  they  will  prove 
exactly  the  opposite  thing  to  you.  In  all 
this,  Bourru  is  just  like  everybody  else. 
Frequently  he  is  grumbling  about  the  ser- 
eant  or  the  platoon-leader  who  plants  him 
the  look-out  oftener  than  is  his  due.  It 
ison  his  shoulders,  he  claims,  that  all  the  dis- 
agi'eeable  duties  fall.  If  somebody  has  to 
put  in  a  night  witli  a  spade  rebuilding  a 
ruined  parapet,  it  is  Bourru  who  gets  the 
order;  if  somebody  has  to  go  three  miles  and 
get  some  gabions  and  planks,  Bourru  is  the 
man;  it's  Bourru  here  and  Bourru  there, 
and  you'd  think  there  wasn't  anybody  but 
Bourru  in  the  squad.  Oh!  the  corporal 
knows  well  enough  that  he  is  not  a  "kicker," 
and  there's  no  danger  of  the  corporal's  giv- 
ing the  order  to  Faraud,  because  Faraud 


134  BOURRU 

would  advise  him  to  "tell  it  to  the  Marines." 
But  the  thing  has  got  to  stop !  Bourru  has 
made  up  his  mind  that  next  time  he  won't  let 
them  force  more  than  his  share  on  him.  He 
declares  to  his  friend  Revel  that  he  will  kick 
over  the  traces,  that  he  will  complain  to  the 
lieutenant,  to  the  captain,  the  major,  the 
colonel,  if  he  has  to!  But  somehow  there 
must  be  a  secret  predestination  for  each  one 
of  us.  Hardly  has  Bourru  finished  declar- 
ing his  rights  to  equality  of  treatment  when 
the  corporal  calls  to  him: 

"Hey,  Bourru!  Go  and  help  get  the 
soup !" 

"All  right,  I'm  going,"  growls  the  soldier. 

Thus  conversation  reflects  the  monotony 
of  the  life.  In  default  of  worthy  subjects, 
one  must  be  content  with  comment  on  the 
little  everyday  happenings.  To-day,  for  in- 
stance, there  is  a  great  sensation  going  the 
rounds  of  Company  6,  which  is  in  the  second 
line  at  la  Maize.    It  is  said  that  the  captain 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS   SHIFT  135 

has  dismissed  his  orderly,  Mezerette.    A  tre- 
mendous piece  of  news ! 

The  thing  was  in  the  air,  to  be  sure;  for 
some  time  the  "old  man"  had  been  "cussing" 
IMezerette  more  than  usual.  If  a  fellow 
passed  by  headquarters  he  was  likely  to  hear 
the  officer  yelling,  "Mezerette,  you  danmed 
idiot,  where  did  you  put  my  toothbrush? 
You  must  be  using  it  to  clean  your  alumi- 
num rings,  you  damned  pig!  Here,  bring 
me  some  water,  and  be  quick  about  it !"  And 
a  fellow  said :  "It's  certainly  getting  hot  for 
Mezerette."  But  the  last  straw,  it  seems, 
was  when  the  "old  man"  surprised  his  or- 
derly in  the  act  of  emptying  a  bottle  on 
which  he  had  written,  "Moral  Force — Sov- 
ereign Remedy  in  a  Crisis — Superfine  Qual- 
ity." For  a  long  time  IMezerette  had  been 
talking  about  this  bottle  in  the  chief's  trunk. 
It  puzzled  him  so  much  that  he  finally  tasted 
it  one  day,  and  found  it  most  excellent  cog- 
nac. Just  as  he  was  getting  mellow,  the  cap- 
tain arrived  on  the  scene. 


136  BOURRU 

"And  oh,  say!"  exclaims  Fabri,  "what  a 
cussing  Mezerette  did  catch!  If  you  had 
heard  that  ..." 

For  a  week  this  story  will  be  going  the 
rounds  of  the  trenches.  Mezerette  declares 
to  all  inquirers  that  he  would  just  as  lief 
take  his  turn  doing  duty ;  but  that  is  not  true, 
and  he  is  really  very  much  ashamed  of  him- 
self. Whom  is  the  captain  going  to  pick  in 
his  place?  It  is  a  serious  question  for  all 
those  who  attach  any  importance  to  that 
other  weighty  question, — the  question  of 
"soft  berths."  Certain  soldiers  are  always 
in  quest  of  a  soft  berth;  and  you  cannot 
imagine  how  much  intriguing  and  parleying 
and  wire-pulling  are  necessary  when  you 
want  to  be  a  driver,  a  cook,  a  hospital  at- 
tendant, or  an  orderly.  Lahurie  invariably 
offers  himself  for  these  duties;  it's  no  mat- 
ter what  berth  he  gets  so  long  as  it  isn't  in 
the  front  line.  You  see  it  isn't  everyone  who 
itches  for  grenade  fights. 

But  our  Bourru  is  too  proud  to  ask  for  a 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS  SHIFT  137 

soft  berth.  As  a  Burgundy  peasant,  in  civil 
life,  "he  just  knows  how  to  cultivate  his 
fields  and  his  vines";  as  a  soldier  he  knows 
only  the  trade  of  fighting — it  is  rather  a 
point  of  pride  with  him.  Deep  down  in  his 
heart  he  might  not  be  at  all  vexed  at  being 
made  a  driver,  for  he  loves  horses,  but  so 
many  people  are  intriguing  for  that  job  that 
he  frankly  prefers  to  abstain  from  making 
any  request  for  it.  Moreover,  he  feels  a  pro- 
found satisfaction  within  himself  for  not  do- 
ing so.  Luckily,  men  of  Bourru's  sort  are 
in  the  majority  in  the  company;  those  brave 
fellows,  who  may  be  none  too  quick-witted, 
though  they  keep  a  clear  head  on  the  firing- 
post,  are  the  solid  foundation  on  which 
France  is  built,  and  they  know  it  and  derive 
from  it  a  satisfaction  of  mind  that  gives  them 
keen  enjoyment. 

Thus  they  go  on,  day  in  and  day  out,  with 
insignificant  interests  filling  the  intervals 
between  the  hours  of  tragedy,  of  attacks  and 
bombardments. 


138  BOURRU 

After  this  description  of  their  monoton- 
ous life,  possibly  you  will  be  tempted  to  re- 
peat the  stereotyped  words  which  have  so 
often  fretted  our  poilus: 

"After  all,  I  suppose  your  worst  enemy  is 
the  idleness  of  the  long  days,  the  bore- 
dom. .  .  ." 

When  you  say  that,  you  are  thinking  of 
the  feeling  of  boredom  as  you  have  known 
it.  Stop  right  there!  For  we  are  not  talk- 
ing about  the  same  thing.  The  trouble  is 
with  the  French  language,  which  gives  the 
same  name  to  two  very  different  feelings. 
Boredom !  When  you  use  the  word  you  have 
the  vision  of  some  sleek  functionary  yawn- 
ing behind  an  office  window.  I  have  heard 
good  women  voicing  their  pity,  in  identical 
words  and  with  identical  sympathies,  for 
the  boredom  that  may  oppress  a  sleepy  nurse 
in  a  hospital  in  the  rear  and  for  the  "bore- 
dom" of  the  soldier  doing  sentinel  duty  in 
the  trenches,  twenty  yards  from  the  Boches. 
Identical  words  make  us  think  the  feelings 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS  SHIFT  139 

are  identicaL  In  the  name  of  Bourru,  I 
protest.  The  thing  which  you  call  the  bore- 
dom of  the  trenches,  my  good  people,  is  a 
thing  infinitely  tragic.  Ah!  How  I  wish  I 
had  the  time  to  write  a  volume  solely  to  ana- 
lyze this  feeling!  I  should  like  to  throw  a 
little  light  on  this  somber  side  of  the  soldier's 
heart,  but  how?  You  are  well  aware  that  I 
am  just  noting  down  a  few  features  of  the 
life  of  Bourru,  and  with  great  rapidity,  like 
^■lan  hurrying  to  record  in  his  note-book 
what  he  has  done  during  the  day.  But  let 
me  tell  you  that  one  thing  which  gives  depth 
to  the  boredom  of  the  soldier  is  the  sensation 
of  death  prowling  around  him.  .  .  . 

one  goes  on,  day  after  day,  week  after 
,  at  the  front.  One  passes  a  grave,  or 
shell-hole;  one  hears  the  batteries  firing, 
and  knows  that  at  any  moment  a  salvo  of 
shells  from  the  enemy  may  crash  down  on 
the  path  he  is  treading,  on  the  roof  of  boards 
that  protects  him  in  the  second  line.  Yes- 
terday the  kitchens  were  bombarded;  the 


140  BOURRU 

day  before  it  was  the  mountain  batteries. 
When  one  is  going  up  to  the  crest,  the  balls 
will  whistle  at  the  place  where  he  takes  the 
path  leading  to  Mamelon-Blanc ;  not  a  few 
of  his  comrades  have  already  fallen  here, 
and  yet  it  is  far  behind  the  first  line.  At  this 
moment  one  is  not  in  the  battle,  one  is  doing 
a  soldier's  duty  in  the  rear,  making  gabions 
or  hurdles,  or  carrying  planks — the  peaceful 
work  of  a  woodman — no,  one  is  not  really  in 
danger  now ;  Bourru  does  not  have  to  run  to 
escape  grenades;  I  repeat  that  at  this  mo- 
ment his  battalion  is  in  the  second  line,  three 
or  four  kilometers  behind  the  line  of  fire. 
But  to-morrow  he  will  go  back  to  the  top,  on 
the  east,  where  he  will  find  the  whole  assem- 
blage of  dangers  that  modern  war  provides. 
After  that  he  will  come  down  to  the  canton- 
ment once  more,  and  then  go  back  up 
again.  .  .  . 

And  this  continues  through  the  weeks  and 
months.  Oh,  yes,  Bourru  gets  bored,  and  he 
will  not  tell  you  that  this  danger  of  death  is 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS   SHIFT  141 

an  element  in  his  boredom, — he  is  too  proud 
for  that.  But  as  for  myself,  I  will  tell  you 
what  I  think.  Man  desires  life  with  all  the 
force  that  his  race  has  collected  and  com- 
municated to  his  fibers.  lie  wants  to  en- 
dure, to  live  on  farther  and  farther  into  the 
future.  But  by  the  exercise  of  his  will  he 
can  conquer  this  powerful  instinct  of  his 
physical  being  to  live  on,  and  can  say  to  it : 
"It  is  my  will  that  you  keep  silence,  that  you 
stay  here  in  this  forest  where  at  any  mo- 
ment a  shell  may  annihilate  me."  But  that 
IT  no  means  enough,  and  Bourru  is  obliged 
eep  up  tlie  parley : 
See  here,  you  poor  old  ])ody  of  mine,  you 
't  understand  anything  but  mere  life, 
■want  to  get  away  from  here,  and  you  are 
always  urging  me  to  fight.  When  I  wake 
up  in  the  morning  it  is  because  you  are  not 
satisfied  that  I  have  that  bitter  taste  in  my 
mouth,  just  from  thinking  of  the  new  day 
that  is  coming.  It's  all  your  fault  that  I 
have  nightmares  when  I'm  asleep  and  see 


142  BOURRU 

myself  in  the  midst  of  exploding  shells, 
crushed  under  my  shelter  or  breathing  my 
last  in  some  abandoned  hole.  Quit  it,  you 
old  carcass ;  we  are  here  and  we're  going  to 
stay.  You  can't  understand,  you  mere  clod 
of  earth,  all  the  reasons  that  have  brought 
us  here.  So  I  shall  not  tell  them  to  you, 
and  for  that  matter,  I  couldn't  if  I  would. 
I  feel  them  all  as  if  they  came  from  far 
away  in  the  past.  .  .  . 

"When  we  were  nothing  but  boys  and  the 
teacher  at  Bligny,  M.  Herard,  told  us  about 
Alsace-Lorraine,  this  thing  was  beginning 
— for  you  were  no  longer  the  master  of  me, 
and  something  was  already  being  born  in  me 
which,  some  day,  was  to  prove  stronger  than 
any  mere  longing  for  life.  It  was  some- 
thing which,  it  seems,  they  call  patriotism; 
and  it's  a  very  complicated  thing.  .  .  .  You 
remember,  there  was  a  worthy  man  in  the 
village,  old  father  Baret,  who  told  us  one 
day  that  in  '70  the  Prussians  had  appeared 
in  the  village  at  the  moment  when  he  was  at 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS   SfflFT  143 

the  cafe  in  the  middle  of  a  game  of  bil- 
liards. 

"  'I  didn't  interrupt  my  game,'  he  said, 
*and  just  to  let  them  see  that  I  was  not  afraid 
of  them,  I  made  a  magnificent  carom  under 
the  nose  of  a  Prussian  sergeant  who  was 
coming  into  the  cafe.  But  I  was  holding 
the  billiard-cue  very  tight;  if  he  had  insulted 
I'd  have  broken  his  head  with  it!' 
*I  remember  how  you  used  to  tremble 
n  old  father  Baret  told  this  little  story 
to  the  child  that  we  were  then.  And  also 
there  were  the  picture-books,  and  the  Saint- 
Baldoux,  the  festival  of  the  patron  saint  of 
the  village,  when  from  his  pulpit  the  priest 
would  tell  us  of  our  forefathers,  of  the  his- 
y  of  France;  and  then  there  were  the 
eches  of  the  deputy,  who  spoke  about 
ial    justice,    civilization,    liberty,    equal- 


'You  see,  you  poor  old  body  of  mine,  it's 

those  things  that   have   gone   into   our 

Lking  and  which  oblige  us  to  stay  here  in 


144  BOURRU 

this  part  of  the  Argonne  where  it  rains 
bombs. 

"And  then,  too,  you  see,  the  others  keep 
staying  here,  and  we've  got  to  do  as  they  do. 
And  then,  anyhow,  you  are  forced  to  staj^ 
here.  But  you  don't  take  to  it  easily,  and  I've 
got  to  work  to  keep  you  down.  If  I  let  you 
speak,  you  keep  on  telling  me  about  the  joy- 
ous past,  and  the  still  more  magnificent  fu- 
ture; you  call  up  the  picture  of  my  mother 
to  move  me  to  tears,  you  force  great  words 
into  my  head  hke  Life,  Happiness,  Peace, 
Tranquillity — you  paint  me  pictures  of 
happy  scenes  where  I  am  sitting  with  a 
group  of  friends,  glass  in  hand,  under  an 
arbor.  And  you  speak  to  me  of  love,  of  fam- 
ily, of  children.  .  .  .  Ah,  how  you  cling  to 
life,  you  pleasure-lover!  Down  with  you! 
At  every  instant  there  rises  in  my  mind  a 
longing  for  life  to  confront  an  image  of 
death.  At  least  that  is  my  supposition,  you 
understand,  for  as  for  me — I  don't  see  all 
this  happening.     I  just  see  the  landscape 


SHIFT  FOLLOWS  SHIFT  145 

look  gloomier,  and  the  sky  blacker  from 
clouds,  and  I  hear  the  roar  of  the  cannon 
grow  more  sinister;  I  am  just  terribly  tired, 
and  I  find  the  soup  unfit  to  eat.  I  sit  mood- 
ily waiting  for  the  coming  night,  during 
which  I  must  do  duty,  up  there! 

"My  face  must  be  pretty  mournful,  for 
Ladoue  is  calling  to  me — 'Iley,  Bourru, 
cheer  up!  I  bet  you  are  bored.  Here,  I'll 
give  you  a  tip  that  the  cyclist  just  passed 
out  to  me.  lie  said  it  just  like  this — *You 
know,'  he  said,  'the  rumor  is  going  round 
that  the  war  won't  last  forever !'  " 

And  Ladoue  bursts  out  laughing. 

"Well,"  concludes  Bouri^,  "I  wish  the 
time  for  work  would  hurry  up,  I've  got  to 
have  something  to  do.  I  guess  I've  got  the 
blues  to-night." 


XIII 
SENTINEL  DUTY 

BOURRU,  soldier  of  the  second  class, 
is  coming  out  of  his  hole  in  the 
ground  early  this  morning,  as  he  does 
every  morning.  Hardly  has  his  head 
reached  the  level  of  the  trench  when  he  rubs 
his  eyes  and  exclaims,  "Hello!  It's  been 
snowing!"  Instantly  his  face  lights  up  with 
the  joyful  surprise,  for  it  is  not  the  mourn- 
ful yellowish  landscape  of  an  aging  winter 
that  is  presented  to  his  eyes,  but  the  very 
first  snow  of  the  year,  clean,  sparkling, 
merry  in  the  sunlight.  Nature  has  put  on 
a  fancy  mask  that  she  may  laugh  a  little. 

Bourru  stands  looking  at  the  landscape. 
Although  he  has  been  here  for  many  months, 

146 


SENTINEL  DUTY  147 

it  is  a  long  time  since  he  has  "seen"  that 
landscape  with  tlie  eyes  of  the  spirit.  What 
could  you  expect?  When  one  is  just  a  good 
machine  for  kilhng  Bodies,  how  can  one  find 
the  time  for  singling  out  the  things  of  beauty 
that  live  in  the  mists  of  the  valleys  or  in  dis- 
tant woodland  prospects? 

But  to-day  Bourru  stands  fixed  in  con- 
templative admiration.  An  old  sentence 
from  his  school-books  is  running  through  his 
memory — "Nature  is  clad  in  her  splendid 
cloak  of  ermine" — and  the  words  rouse  in  his 
mind  a  long  train  of  visions.  He  recalls  his 
boyish  delight  in  rolling  up  great  balls  of 
snow;  he  thinks  of  winter  evenings  in  the 
family  circle  on  the  farm,  when  they  sat 
around  the  ingle-nook  drinking  white  wine 
and  munching  chestnuts,  while  outside  the 
wind  whistled  and  the  dogs  kept  tune  with 
their  howls  and,  within,  the  demure  young 
|H|s  instinctively  threw  glances  at  the  stout 
Torms  of  the  boys.  And  the  old  people 
lid  tell  their  long,  long  stories — they  had 


148  BOURRU 

time  for  it  in  the  winter,  that  season  of 
holiday  that  would  continue  and  con- 
tinue .  .  .  until  springtime.  And  then,  at 
New  Year's,  there  would  be  presents  for  the 
mother  to  distribute  to  the  children  with 
tears  in  her  eyes.  .  .  .  All  is  naive,  uncor- 
rupted,  white,  in  the  childlike  soul  of  my 
Bourru. 

Crash!  Boom!  Suddenly  a  great  beast 
of  a  shell  explodes  in  the  snow  at  a  little  dis- 
tance, as  incongruous  as  some  coarse  breach 
of  etiquette  from  a  blundering  fool  in  a 
drawing-room  during  the  recital  of  a  rare, 
noble  poem. 

"Shut  up,  you  black  beast !  You  make  me 
sick!" 

But  in  vain  does  Bourru  try  to  recall  his 
tender  and  endearing  vision — his  soul  has 
once  more  become  fierce  and  brutal,  as  be- 
comes a  man  who  is  on  his  way  to  drink  down 
his  "juice"  and  then  take  his  turn  on  the 
look-out. 

He  arrives  at  his  post. 


SENTINEL  DUTY  149 

'Ah,  here  you  are!'*  says  the  comrade  he 
is  reheving. 

"Nothing  new?"  asks  Bourru. 

"Fritz  is  shooting  this  way.  Be  careful 
and  don't  let  him  see  you." 

'No  danger!" 

And  they  change  places.  One  man  goes 
off,  glad  of  the  chance  to  lie  down  for  a  few 
peaceful  hours  in  the  depths  of  a  dug-out; 
another  man  has  taken  his  place  at  a  little 
aperture  opening  toward  the  enemy. 

Bourru  takes  a  look  round.  The  parapet 
is  unchanged;  still  the  same  wall  of  sand- 
bags and  gabions,  thrown  together  pell-mell 
in  defiance  of  the  laws  of  equilibrium. 
There  are  logs  to  prop  it  up  at  the  points 
where  it  leans  too  dangerously;  in  this  way 
it  will  last  for  some  hours  yet,  perhaps  for 
some  days  even,  until  the  trench-mortars  go 
to  work  again  and  demolish  it. 

'he  peep-hole  opens  through  this  wall — 
a  little  slit  between  two  sand-bags  placed 
crooked  on  purpose,  so  that  the  hole  may 


150  BOURRU 

seem  to  have  come  about  by  accident.  In 
order  that  the  opening,  seen  from  outside, 
may  not  show  against  the  sky,  an  empty  sack 
has  been  suspended  inside  it,  to  form  a 
"photographer's  hood."  When  the  observer 
is  looking  out  he  has  the  hood  behind  his 
head,  and  for  the  Boche  out  in  front  there  is 
no  alteration  in  the  appearance  of  the  wall. 

"IVe  got  to  see  what's  going  on,"  Bourru 
says  to  himself,  but  he  still  waits  a  few  min- 
utes. It  seems  very  simple,  doubtless,  to  risk 
a  glance  through  the  slit  in  the  wall.  But 
when  you  know  that  Blanchard,  Renaud, 
Cortu,  and  many  another  got  a  bullet  in  the 
head  at  the  exact  moment  when  he  took  a 
peep — well,  it's  all  right  to  be  named 
Bourru  and  to  wear  the  croiiV  de  guerre,  but 
— you  hesitate  I 

Not  very  long,  of  course.  With  great 
caution  Bourru  slips  his  head  under  the 
hood;  the  enemy's  wall,  made  out  of  bags 
just  like  ours,  is  thirty  yards  away.  In  front 
of  it  is  thrown  up  rubbish  of  all  sorts,  with 


SENTINEL  DUTY  151 

old  gabions,  twisted  barbed-wire,  and  chcv- 
aux-de-frise  which  the  snow  cannot  com- 
pletely disguise.  In  the  distance  the  plain 
opens  out  in  a  white  expanse,  dotted  here 
and  there  by  dark  little  clumps  of  trees;  on 
the  horizon  a  cliurch  steeple  stands  out 
above  hills  whose  beautiful  lines  join  har- 
moniously in  a  dark  blue  base  for  the  thin 
white  clouds  above  them. 

"And  to  think  that  all  that  land  is  our 
own!  Ah,  they've  got  to  get  off  it,  the  rob- 
bers!'' For  a  moment  Bourru  feels  the  rage 
of  a  feudal  lord  dispossessed  of  a  fine  do- 


f  only  I  could  see  one  of  tlieir  loop- 
holes, the  beasts!  I'd  start  them  jumping!'* 
But  no  fissures  can  be  seen  in  the  opposing 
wall. 

Bourru  lowers  his  head  and  retires.  It  is 
time — spat!  a  bullet  comes  straight  through 
the  opening.  A  hole  remains  in  the  hood  as 
indubitable  evidence  of  the  risk  he  has  run. 

Our  man  turns  pale  and  staggers  a  little ; 


152  BOURRU 

his  heart  beats  fast  and  his  fingers  are 
twitching.  Does  it  surprise  you?  Perhaps 
you  thought  that  at  the  least  the  explosion 
of  a  hundred-pound  bomb  was  necessary  to 
kill  a  brave  man?  For  Bourru  is  brave;  he 
is  going  to  prove  it,  and  without  having  to 
leap  over  the  parapet  crying  "Forward!" 

The  humble  soldier  first  stands  still  for  a 
few  minutes  monotonously  repeating,  "Ah, 
good!  Good!  That  was  a  close  shave!" 
But  then  another  idea  comes  to  him.  "I've 
got  to  look  out  again — through  that  same 
hole — for  the  deuce  of  it  is  that  the  bombing 
last  night  closed  up  all  the  others !" 

Do  you  understand  that  a  mighty  little 
thing  is  needed  to  gain  admission  among  the 
heroes  ?  Bourru  is  all  alone  in  his  nook  in  the 
trenches,  under  the  winter  sky,  in  the  early 
morning  silence  broken  only  by  rare  rifle 
cracks, — is  he  going  to  move  his  head  those 
three  or  four  inches  to  look  out  through  the 
hole?  It  would  be  so  easy  to  sit  down  in  the 
bottom  of  the  trench.  .  .  . 


SENTINEL  DUTY  168 

Fifteen  minutes  later,  the  lieutenant  ap- 
pears unexpectedly  on  his  round.  Bour- 
ru's  head  emerges  from  the  liood  under 
which  he  is  watching  the  enemy,  and  he  re- 
ports phlegmatically: 
J'othing  new." 
Good;  carry  on,"  says  the  officer. 

And  our  soldier  takes  his  place  again 
under  the  hood,  hcfore  the  opening  through 
which  he  can  see  the  crows  hovering  over  the 
landscape. 


XIV 
A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COLONEL 

BOURRU  and  his  comrades  are  at 
work  digging  a  new  trench.  Dur- 
ing the  last  attack,  some  days  ago, 
they  managed  to  push  forward  some  ten 
yards — which  was  great  work!  But  what  a 
situation!  It  is  a  dare-devil's  trench,  pure 
and  simple.  To  get  to  it,  you  must  first  of 
all  crawl  through  a  connecting  trench  less 
than  half  a  yard  deep,  slip  under  a  rail  that 
used  to  serve  as  support  to  a  ruined  shelter, 
then,  still  crawling,  get  across  an  old  heam, — 
and  at  this  moment,  with  less  than  eight 
inches  of  earth  to  protect  you,  you  run  the 
risk  of  being  seen  from  Cheppy — and  in  this 
way  you  finally  get  to  the  trench. 

154 


A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COLONEL     155 

It  cannot  be  dug  fast,  this  trench — the 
ground  is  very  hard,  you  must  work  lying 
down,  and  the  balls  are  whistling.  To  make 
his  men  hustle  Sergeant  Goupy  has  con- 
ceived a  bright  idea. 

"Say,  boys,  hurry  up  and  get  the  trench  in 
shape — I  just  got  word  that  the  colonel  is 
coming  this  Wi^y!" 

I^Df  course,  the  sergeant  made  up  that 
story,  but  when  you  have  to  make  men  work, 
you  know  you  try  whatever  tricks  you  can 
invent. 

Ever  since  morning  tlie  men  have  been 
talking  about  nothing  but  this  visit,  highly 
nnprobable  as  it  seems  to  them. 

'*You  bet  your  life  he  won't  come,"  says 
one;  "he'd  be  a  fool  to  try  it!" 

nd,   as   a  matter   of   fact,   a   volley   of 
ades    arrives    every    minute    from    the 
r  side,  and  the  "Sis-Boom!"  from  the 
alteries  at  Cheppy  is  never  interrupted. 

"I  should  say  he  won't  come!"  says 
Bourru.    "If  I  were  in  his  place,  you  bet  I 


one; 
Dattc 


156  BOURRU 

wouldn't  go  and  get  myself  blown  up  for 
nothing !" 

"Oh,  thunder!"  chimes  in  Lachard;  "y^^ 
never  know  what  that  fellow  will  do  next — 
he's  always  up  to  something  queer !" 

Lafut,  nicknamed  Booze,  who  has  not  yet 
forgotten  the  two  weeks  he  spent  in  jail  for 
a  recent  "jamboree,"  is  grumbling: 

"I'm  telling  you  that  he  will  come,  all 
right,  and  what's  more  he'll  give  hell  to  some- 
body when  he  gets  here!" 

"Well,  if  the  old  boy  ever  gets  into  this 
hole,"  puts  in  another,  "he  will  need  a  damn 
lot  of  nerve  with  him." 

"While  you're  waiting,  keep  at  it!"  orders 
the  sergeant. 

And  they  do  keep  at  it,  but  under  what 
conditions!  Bourru  is  placing  an  old  Ger- 
man shield  on  the  crumbling  earth  thrown 
up  in  front  of  him  and  with  the  tip  of  his 
finger  is  trying  to  steady  the  mass  of  iron, 
even  while  the  bullets  are  flattening  them- 
selves against  it. 


I 


A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COLONEL     157 

All  at  once,  they  hear  a  familiar,  clean-cut 
voice : 

"Hello,  boys!  How  goes  it?" 
It  is  the  colonel!  As  usual,  he  is  fault- 
lessly neat,  with  waxed  mustache,  trim  sky- 
blue  tunic,  and  spotless  white  cuffs.  In  de- 
fiance of  all  regulations  he  is  wearing  his 
eternally  new  cap  with  gold  bands,  and  from 
beneath  the  visor  two  sparkling  eyes,  made 
to  conmiand,  are  fastened  on  liourru,  near 
whom  the  colonel  has  just  emerged  from  the 
ecting-trench. 

ut    nothing    like    this    can    intimidate 
rru,  for  hardly  has  the  colonel  appeared 
n  he  feels  the  hand  of  our  soldier  seize 
him  by  the  skirt  of  his  tunic,  and  in  an  in- 

■it  the  colonel  is  rudely  flung  flat  on  the 
t  was  time.  On  top  of  the  parapet, 
yard  behind  the  officer,  sizzled  a 
nade.  But  for  the  quick  movement  of 
our  soldier  in  throwing  the  colonel  prone 
his   face,   there   would   have   been   one 


whon 

HKr 

^■Wen 


158  BOURRU 

more  vacancy  in  the  ranks  of  the  French 
colonels. 

"Thanks,  old  fellow,"  says  the  colonel; 
"you  have  saved  my  life,  and  you  will  get  a 
citation  for  it.  But  you  have  made  me  soil 
my  tunic,  hang  it  all !  For  your  punishment, 
you  can  come  and  clean  it,  and  then  have 
lunch  with  me." 

"What  did  I  tell  you?"  asks  Lafut,  when 
the  colonel  has  departed.  "Didn't  I  tell  you 
he'd  give  hell  to  somebody?" 


XV 


THE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER, 
1914. 


THE    cantonments    wliere   the    regi- 
ments from  Vauquois  passed  their 
periods  of  rest  were  httle  villages  in 
the  Meuse  country  which,  in  ordinary  times, 
Id  not  have  held  a  tourist's  attention  for 
e  minutes.     They  were  all  alike — Auze- 
le,  Jubecourt,  Ville-sur-Cousance,  Julve- 
cpurt,  Ippecourt ;  a  single  street  bordered  by 
ns,  with  walls  of  mud-plaster,  in  which 
soldiers  passed  their  lives  huddled  up  on 
aw  that  was  none  too  fresh.    "Why  should 
rouble  you  with  the  story  of  their  insipid 
e  in  the  rest-camps?     The  insignificant 
nts  that  filled  it  would  be  tiresome  to  re- 

159 


160  BOURRU 

port;  you  would  only  see  Bourru  and  all  the 
others  intent  on  the  betterment  of  their  ma- 
terial surroundings.  Bourru  goes  to  buy 
eggs  and  milk  from  mother  Dupont  or  father 
Minard ;  he  racks  his  wits  to  find  a  comfort- 
able corner  in  a  loft;  he  raises  a  fuss  over 
the  tormenting  rats  that  come  in  the  night 
and  wake  you  up  biting  your  hand;  he  com- 
plains because  he  does  not  find  the  hospital- 
ity of  the  Meuse  folk  warm  enough,  though 
when  he  leaves  the  village  he  will  go  off  with 
a  tender  feeling  in  his  heart,  saying,  "They 
are  good  people,  all  right."  Nor  shall  I  ex- 
patiate on  the  exercises  and  the  manoeuvers, 
those  nightmares  of  the  soldier's  life. 

But  once  in  a  while,  there  would  arise  out 
of  this  monotonous  existence  grave  moments, 
carrying  the  souls  of  the  men  away  as  into 
a  dream.  The  graves  of  the  soldiers  in  the 
battle  of  September,  1914,  were  an  occasion 
for  such  an  experience.  I  was  speaking  a 
moment  ago  of  the  commonplace  character 
of  the  villages  along  the  Meuse,  but  at  the 


THE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER,  1914     161 

very  moment  at  which  I  am  writing,  if  you 
will  look,  you  can  see  the  landscape  become 
inexpressibly  moving.  Two  years  ago  there 
was  fighting  here,  between  the  troops  of  the 
mobile  defence  of  Verdun  and  the  army  of 
the  Crown  Prince.  How  far  away  it  is,  that 
battle  of  the  Marne,  in  19141  How  long 
ago,  when  the  soldiers  had  red  trousers  and 
caps! 

During  every  sojourn  at  Ville-sur-Cous- 
at  Jubecourt,  or  at  Ippecourt,  Bourru 
d  to  feel  that  his  comrades  who  had  died 
m  the  beginning  of  tlie  war  belonged  already 
to  past  history.  A  halo  of  glory  shone  upon 
them.  And  nevertheless  he  had  been  one  in 
their  ranks.  The  thing  gave  him  a  queer 
ling  of  being  an  old  man  who  remem- 
ed  having  known,  in  his  youth,  men  who 

re  illustrious. 

What  a  spell  those  tombs  thus  have  over 
the  soldiers!  The  most  hardened  among 
them  feel  "something  that  stirs  them  up," 
to  use  Bourru's  words,  when  chance  brings 


162  BOURRU 

them  face  to  face  with  a  wooden  cross  stand- 
ing in  the  middle  of  a  field.  And  there  are 
many  such  crosses.  On  the  hillsides,  and  in 
the  plain,  they  sometimes  crowd  each  other. 
In  certain  nooks,  also,  they  rise  isolated — 
almost  unsociable,  it  would  seem. 

Come,  let  us  follow  Bourru  and  some  of 
his  fellows  on  a  walk  through  a  little  valley 
a  few  miles  from  Jubecourt.  It  is  one  of 
those  autumn  afternoons  in  which  nature 
constrains  us  to  tender  meditation.  The  lit- 
tle group  of  soldiers  tread  down  suffering 
plants  as  they  walk ;  in  the  distance  the  voice 
of  the  cannonade  rises  like  the  great  lamen- 
tation of  an  agonized  land.  A  soft  melan- 
choly rests  upon  the  spirits  of  the  men,  and 
its  savor  is  pleasant  to  them,  such  is  its  con- 
trast with  the  brutality  of  their  customary 
struggle. 

Hard  by  a  certain  bush  they  suddenly  no- 
tice a  grave.  A  mound  all  but  hidden  in  the 
grass,  a  cross,  half-falling  and  without  in- 
scription, and  a  soldier's  weather-beaten  cap 


THE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER,  19U     1G3 

are  all  that  announce  that  here  rests  for  eter- 
nity a  hero  of  the  battle  of  September.  All 
about,  in  the  damp  vale,  is  silence,  solitude, 
and  comfortless  shade.  The  trees  seem  to 
be  rooted  up  in  this  valley  of  death  where 
the  herbs  are  rottinp^.  Your  imagination 
pauses  over  the  terrible  work  of  the  earth 
with  the  human  body;  it  has  disappeared  in 
the  soil,  is  dissolving  into  brute  matter. 
Soon  every  trace  of  it  will  have  vanished,  and 
here  where  a  drama  was  enacted  in  men's 
agony,  the  future  passer-by  will  look  upon 
no  more  than  a  sea  of  grass  rolling  its  in- 
different waves. 

The  soldiers  have  paused,  and  confused 
feelings  are  at  work  in  their  minds.  They 
would  be  quite  incapable  of  putting  these 
feelings  into  words;  but  have  they  need  of 
words  in  order  to  know  the  melancholy 
poetry  of  the  grave  ?  Only  look  upon  them, 
these  Bourrus,  silent  and  motionless  before 
that  cross — it  is  as  if  they  were  listening  to 
the  sound  of  music  within  them.    Poor,  un- 


164.  BOURRU 

cultivated  peasants,  you  say?  To  me  they 
seem  like  men  inspired ! 

Undoubtedly  their  first  emotion  sprang 
from  the  selfish  instinct  of  self-defence 
which  our  love  of  life  arouses  at  any  image 
of  death. 

"To  think  that  I  might  be  lying  there 
where  he  is!"  thinks  each  one. 

But  now  the  melancholy  that  springs  up 
irresistibly  at  the  sight  of  a  grave  is  en- 
nobling the  faces  of  these  rude  soldiers. 

It  was  long  ago,  in  his  native  village,  dur- 
ing burial  services  at  the  church  or  the  ceme- 
tery, that  Bourru  began  to  feel  that  there 
was  something  more  in  life  than  toiling  along 
the  furrow  like  a  beast  of  burden.  All  that 
is  philosophy,  all  that  is  religion,  all  that  is 
of  the  spirit,  entered  his  soul  at  those  mo- 
ments as  a  ray  of  sunshine  falls  across  a 
misty  landscape.  Emotions  and  ideas  lifted 
themselves  within  him,  coming  from  far 
down  in  the  depths  of  his  unconscious  self. 
To-day  the  same  process  is  at  work  in  him. 


THE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER,  1914     165 

IMeditating  before  this  deserted  grave, 
Bourru  is  imbued  with  a  new  emotion — the 
fear  that  his  brother  is  sleeping  there  un- 
known, forever  forgotten.  In  this  desolate 
valley  our  soldier  feels  the  force  of  the  im- 
placable law  which  provides  that  matter  shall 
efface  the  traces  of  even  the  most  grandiose 
dramas.  And  Bourru  muses.  He  sees  the 
soldiers  of  1914  marching  forward  through 
this  valley  into  battle.  The  terrain  is  pro- 
pitious for  an  attack.  What  feelings  must 
have  burned  in  their  hearts!  They  looked 
into  each  other's  eyes  in  full  conn*adeship, 
while  death  hovered  above  them. 

"If  I  fall,"  one  of  them  was  saying,  "here 
is  the  address  of  my  wife ;  write  to  her,  won't 
you?" 

The  other  in  turn  gives  the  address  of  his 
family,  and  a  clasp  of  hands  seals  the  agree- 
ment. Suddenly  the  shrapnel  descends,  and 
a  soldier  falls ;  no  one  has  time  to  come  to  1ms 
aid.  But  what  gi-ief  in  the  hearts  of  those 
abandon  him!    In  a  wild  burst  of  reso- 


166  BOURRU 

lution  they  look  back  for  the  last  time  at 
their  fallen  comrade  and  take  oath  that  this 
picture  shall  never  leave  their  minds.  Na- 
ture herself  seems  to  take  part  in  this  sol- 
emn engagement,  for  the  mutilated  trees,  the 
torn  plants,  the  shredded  soil,  all  seem  to 
bleed  for  a  wound  that  cannot  heal,  and  the 
ancient  meadow  seems  to  show  the  face  of  a 
wild  mother  cradling  her  dead  child. 

Ah,  no !  The  soldier  will  not  be  forgotten, 
for  back  at  home,  in  the  circle  of  his  friends 
and  his  family,  when  the  news  of  his  death 
brought  its  shock,  the  memory  of  the  hero 
seemed  immortal,  so  great  was  the  emotion 
of  his  comrades,  the  grief  of  his  kindred. 

"And  yet,  here  you  are,  poor  fellow," 
murmurs  Bourru,  "here  you  are,  all  alone, 
forgotten.  Hardly  two  years  have  passed, 
and  I,  who  am  still  here,  don't  even  know 
your  name.  Where  are  they,  those  com- 
rades who  swore  they  would  remember? 
Dead,  perhaps,  or  hardened  by  other  griefs. 
There  is  someone  to  remember  you — wife. 


rHE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER,  1914     167 

mother,  children?  And  yet,  who  knows? 
Ah'eady,  perhaps,  your  picture  is  fading  out 
of  their  minds!  And  the  winter  is  coming, 
and  then  the  spring;  the  plowmen  will  efface 
tiie  marks  of  cannon-balls,  the  lark  will  sing, 
the  trees  will  bud  again,  and  complete  obliv- 
ion will  swallow  you  up  like  a  faded 
leaf." 

Oh,  no,  Bourru  does  not  say  all  this!  But 
he  feels  it,  sometimes  in  pity,  sometimes  in 
revolt  against  the  injustice  of  life,  because 
the  living  never  turn  to  contemplate  those 
who  remain  immobile  in  the  shadow. 

And  behold  how,  through  this  pity  and 
this  revolt,  our  humble  peasant  rises  to  a 
higher  moral  life.  Bourru  is  determined  not 
to  forget;  in  him  the  cult  of  the  dead  is  be- 
coming a  reality. 

Behold  him  now,  my  Bourru,  see  him  busy 
straightening  crosses,  putting  graves  in  or- 
der, tearing  up  the  wild  weeds  on  the 
mounds,  and  then,  baring  his  head,  pray- 
ing. ..  . 


168  BOURRU 

And  now  he  goes  back  to  the  cantonment, 
but  with  his  mind  musing  in  a  vague  melan- 
choly. The  hour  has  come  for  the  festival  of 
the  sunset ;  far  away,  over  the  thatched  roofs, 
innumerable  threads  of  gossamer  stretched 
above  the  ground  form  a  silken  carpet  across 
which  the  sun  leaves  a  shining  pathway  as 
when  it  sinks  beneath  the  sea.  And  the  sol- 
diers think  of  that  other  shining  pathway 
which  the  memory  of  their  fallen  comrades 
ought  to  leave  in  good  men's  minds. 

Under  the  oblique  rays,  still  brilliant, 
every  tree  is  resplendent  with  its  peculiar 
hues.  The  slender  birches  stand  out  pale 
and  yellow,  almost  diaphanous;  the  cherries 
flame  forth  like  red  torches;  the  ruddiness 
of  the  oaks  triumphs  over  the  somber  green 
of  the  pines.  So  should  the  glory  of  the  sol- 
diers who  have  died  for  their  country  illum- 
inate the  living,  in  such  a  way  as  to  bring  into 
relief  the  virtues  proper  to  each. 

Over  all  the  hill-crests,  spread  out  as  far 
as  the  eye  can  reach,  falls  an  ineffable  peace 


THE  GRAVES  OF  SEPTEMBER,  1914.     169 

and  majesty,  and  all  nature  vibrates  in  a  di- 
vine harmony.  Oh,  eternal  beauty  of  this 
splendid  and  simple  spectacle!  At  the  mo- 
ment when  the  sun  sinks  to  rest  below  the 
horizon,  is  there  a  soul,  even  of  the  coarsest, 
that  does  not  feel  some  revelation  of  poetic 
power,  however  unsuspected? 

To-day  Bourru  and  his  friends  have  been 
moved  by  the  memory  of  a  comrade;  they 
will  keep  the  impression  a  long  tune.  The 
spirit  of  the  dead  will  live  on  in  their  hearts, 
and  it  is  this  fact,  perhaps,  which  explains 
that  strange  impression  of  nobility  that  you 
have  experienced  when  Bourru,  meeting  you 
in  the  street,  at  Paris,  has  fastened  on  you 
his  deep-seeing  eyes.  They  were  eyes  which, 
during  the  periods  of  rest  at  Jubccourt,  at 
Ville-sur-Cousance,  at  Julvecourt,  at  Ippe- 
court,  had  often  looked  beneath  the  sod  into 
the  graves  of  his  conu'ades  of  September, 
1914. 


XVI 
BxlGGING  A  SENTINEL 

WHEN  you  were  a  child  were  you 
always  itching  to  get  away  on  an 
expedition  into  the  great  black 
forest  in  which  your  mother  had  seen  hid- 
eous serpents  and  warned  you  of  them,  that 
forest  which  your  imagination  peopled  with 
beasts  still  more  monstrous — but  whom  it 
would  be  splendid  to  encounter?  If  you 
were,  you  know  the  strange  excitement  of 
hair-breadth  risks,  and  you  hardly  need  my 
poor  words  to  see  the  fire  burning  in  the 
eyes  of  Bourru  while  Sergeant  Stokreisser 
is  mysteriously  talking  to  him,  in  a  hushed 
voice,  in  a  nook  of  the  trenches. 

"Yes,  I  saw  the  colonel.    They  want  us 

170 


BAGGING  A  SENTINEL  171 

to  see  if  we  can  get  the  Boche  sentinel  in  the 
woods.  We'll  get  two  weeks  oflp — it's  for  to- 
night.   Are  you  game?" 

Bourru's  heart  is  jumping  at  the  chance, 
but  he  takes  his  time  before  giving  in,  like  a 
man  who  wants  to  enjoy  his  dive. 

"That  depends.  .  .  .  Who's  going  along?" 

"There'll  be  Huguenin,  Dufour — Au- 
bouin — La  Volige — nervy  boys,  ehl  .  .  . 
And  maybe  Faraud,  too.  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  that  fellow!"  grunts  Bourru.  "Bet- 
ter look  out — he'll  have  cold  feet,  for 
sure.  .  .  ." 

All  day  long  the  sergeant  is  running 
through  tlie  battalion's  trenches.  In  great 
secrecy  he  is  making  offers,  dcchning  oth- 
ers .  .  .  and  coming  to  terms.  One  man  ac- 
cepts, but  on  condition  that  his  pal  shall  be 
in  it;  another  one  makes  demands  worthy 
of  an  American  milhonaire  to  whom  a  com- 
bine is  proposed. 

Ten  o'clock  comes.  The  ^ve  men  and  the 
sergeant  are  near  Cigalerie.    Calm  weather, 


172  BOURRU 

a  dark  night — but  none  too  dark.  Far  away 
you  hear  the  ordinary  noises;  with  a  few 
crackling  rifle-shots. 

"I've  a  hunch  that  the  Lord  is  for  us," 
says  Dufour.    "We'll  make  it!" 

The  men  are  armed  with  revolvers  and 
knives;  their  helmets  are  covered  with  blue 
tent-canvas,  of  coarse  texture,  to  prevent  re- 
flection from  the  rockets. 

The  sergeant  explains  his  plan.  Divided 
into  two  gi'oups,  twenty  yards  apart,  they 
are  going  to  crawl  to  the  little  willow- tree; 
then  they  will  turn  to  the  left,  twenty  paces 
from  the  river,  and  they  will  come  to  the 
wood  where  the  Boche  sentinels  are. 

"If  I'm  hit,"  he  adds,  "Bourru  takes  com- 
mand. And  we're  going  to  see  this  thing 
through,  you  know — we've  got  to  bring  back 
a  sentinel.  .  .  ." 

At  the  moment  of  going  over  the  top, 
Bourru  is  thinking: 

"What  an  ass  I  am,  starting  into  another 
scrap  to  get  my  head  broken !    Am  I  always 


BAGGING  A  SENTINEL  173 

going  to  be  like  this?  And  I  swore  last  time 
I  wouldn't  do  it  again.  .  .  .  Well,  anyway, 
now  is  no  time  to  hang  back." 

It  is  not  easy,  this  crawling  on  your  stom- 
ach. After  half  an  hour  of  it  your  shoulders 
are  wrenched  out  of  joint,  and  yet  you  have 
hardly  come  a  hundred  yards.  But  you  have 
to  move  slowly  in  order  to  make  no  slightest 
noise. 

Thunder!  There's  Dufour  starting  a  peb- 
ble I  Up  goes  a  rocket.  Our  men,  plastered 
to  the  ground,  check  every  motion  and  even 
stop  breathing.  If  they  are  seen,  the  ma- 
^be  gun  will  begin  to  spit.  .  .  . 

The  rocket  has  gone  out.  All  remains 
quiet — thank  heaven!  The  men  breathe 
freely  again,  but  the  silence  seems  to  possess 
a  solemnity;  one  is  afraid  of  profaning  it  by 
resuming  his  course. 

The  gi'ound  has  been  riddled  with  shell- 
holes,  and  is  obstructed  by  rubbish  of  every 
sort.  What's  this?  An  old  network  of 
barbed-wire  that  still  stands  firm. 


174  BOURRU 

Luckily,  Bourru  has  his  shears  with  him. 
He  cuts  a  passage  for  himself.  It  is  not 
very  hard — he  is  still  two  hundred  yards 
from  the  enemy  sentinels.  .  .  .  Hello, 
there's  a  dog  barking! 

"Ah,  the  beasts!"  thinks  La  Voltige; 
"they've  got  war-dogs  to  track  us.  We're 
done  for!" 

For  you  know  well  enough,  I  suppose, 
that  if  a  man  is  discovered  at  a  hundred  and 
jSf ty  yards  from  the  trench,  there's  no  chance 
of  his  escaping.  He  would  be  shot  down  be- 
fore he  had  gone  five  yards.  The  best  luck 
he  can  have  is  to  find  a  shell-hole  where  he 
can  wait — sometimes  for  two  or  three 
days — for  a  good  moment  to  run  for  his 
trench. 

The  dog  stops  his  noise.  A  light  appears 
over  toward  the  German  trench.  It  is  mov- 
ing— you  can  see  it  passing  the  loop-holes 
one  after  another.  Does  it  mean,  maybe, 
that  the  Germans  are  getting  sometliing 
:'"adv  for  us? 


BAGGING  A  SENTINEL  175 

Here  we  are  at  last  by  the  torn  little  wil- 
low-tree; only  a  hundred  yards  more! 

All  at  once  a  frog  jumps  into  the  brook. 
Without  a  moment's  tliought  Faraud  lets 
off  his  revolver. 

"Hang  the  idiot!"  thinks  Bourru.  "I 
knew  he'd  have  cold  feet !" 

On  the  instant  tlie  fusillade  grows  fu- 
rious. Bang!  Bang!  Bang!  From  every 
quarter  the  machine  guns  spit  out  their  whis- 
tling balls. 

Lucky  our  brave  fellows  are  quick-witted. 
They  are  well  aware  that  at  night  the  ma- 
chine gams  shave  the  ground  in  order  to  get 
men  lying  down.  Four  of  our  scouts  have 
thrown  themselves  flat  in  a  hole.  Bourru, 
who  happened  to  be  near  the  willow,  seeing 
no  hole  at  the  moment,  climbed  the  tree  and 
flattened  himself  against  the  trunk.  The 
balls  are  passing  in  a  sheet  underneath  him, 
cutting  the  air  between  him  and  his  com- 
rades. 

At  the  end  of  fifteen  minutes  the  fury  of 


176  BOURRU 

the  firing  abates.  After  all,  "they"  had  seen 
nothing;  so  why  should  they  keep  it  up? 
But  all  the  same  enough  has  happened  to 
cool  a  man's  ardor.  Shall  we  go  on?  Our 
men  take  counsel  with  one  another. 

"I'm  going  on,  myself,"  says  Aubouin. 
"I  want  those  two  weeks  off." 

So  the  crawling  continues,  still  more 
slowly.  Our  men  are  coming  up  to  the 
enemy — the  sentinels  must  be  only  ten  or 
fifteen  yards  away,  behind  that  black  thing 
you  think  you  see  there.  The  motions  of 
our  men  are  as  soft  and  slow  as  those  of  a 
eat  about  to  leap  on  her  prey. 

Suddenly  the  man  in  the  lead  stops.  One 
yard  in  front  of  him  he  has  just  discovered 
an  unexpected  wire  entanglement  that  ap- 
pears to  surround  the  sentinels'  position. 
For  their  protection  the  Boches  have  made 
themselves  cages  like  those  of  beasts  at  the 
menagerie. 

"Oh,  the  devil!  How  are  we  going  to  get 
at  them?" 


BAGGING  A  SENTIxNEL  177 

Stokreisser  and  Bourru  lift  tlieir  heads 
three  inches  from  the  ground  and  look  de- 
spairingly at  the  wires,  which  have  old  cans 
suspended  among  them — the  least  touch  will 
start  the  whole  thing  clattering  and  raise  the 
alarm. 

Bourru  feels  a  hitter  taste  in  his  mouth. 
It  is  the  sign  of  moral  defeat;  Napoleon 
watching  the  catastrophe  at  Waterloo  felt 
_for  the  same  reason  that  Bourru  does,  as- 
ining  that  his  patrol  is  going  to  fail, 
luddenly  a  man's  shoulders  move  in  the 
:,  above  the  net-work:  it  is  the  German 
iinel,  vaguely  disturbed,  investigating, 
thing  in  sight — absolute  quiet;  the  scouts 
js  their  bodies  flat  to  the  ground.  The 
low  disappears.  What's  to  be  done? 
lergeant  Stokreisser  crawls  along  the 
wire  net-work  to  the  right,  while  Bourru 
does  the  same  thing  to  the  left.  Suddenly 
the  sergeant's  heart  leaps  up  in  a  tumult  of 
joy — for  he  finds  that  when  the  net-work 
reaches  the   brook   it  stops.     The   Boches 


178  BOURRU 

thought  the  little  river  was  protection 
enough  for  their  sentinel. 

A  signal  is  transmitted  from  man  to  man, 
and  the  scouts  crawl  to  the  brook.  Without 
a  spoken  word,  they  come  to  agreement.  Si- 
lently— very  silently — they  let  themselves 
down  into  the  water.  Fortunately  it  is  only 
a  yard  and  a  half  deep  at  its  deepest.  But 
what  a  racket  a  man  makes  going  through 
the  water!  You  can't  imagine  it — ^but  try 
it  and  you  will  know. 

Fifteen  yards  more,  and  we  are  only  four 
paces  from  the  sentinels.  There  they  are  in 
the  shadow.  Hearts  beat  fast  now.  Here 
is  a  lucky  tree;  Bourru  helps  Dufour  up, 
La  Voltige  pushes  the  sergeant.  .  .  . 

Well,  yes,  at  the  risk  of  making  you  smile, 
I  shall  use  the  threadbare  phrase  of  the  dime 
novel:  "Quick  as  a  flash"  our  soldiers  have 
leaped  upon  the  Boches.  .  .  .  Five  minutes 
later  the  pair  of  them  are  bound,  gagged, 
and    rolled    up    in    a    tent-cloth    like    big 


BAGGING  A  SENTINEL 


179 


sausages.  They  have  had  no  chance  to  make 
a  sound.  And  a  nightingale  lamenting  the 
sorrows  of  her  heart  a  few  yards  away  has 
not  even  interrupted  her  song. 

"But  see  here!"  says  Stokreisser,  "we 
don't  want  to  drag  hoth  those  hundles  there, 
— one  is  a  plenty." 

"We've  got  to  quiet  the  one  we  leave  l)e- 
hind,"  whispers  La  Voltige.  "If  we  don't 
he'll  try  to  call  out  the  minute  we  get  away, 
and  if  he  gives  the  alarm  it's  good-night  for 
us  on  the  way  hack." 

"Sure — we've  got  to  fix  him,"  the  soldiers 
agree.  "It's  him  or  us,  and  it  had  hetter  he 
him.    All's  fair  in  war." 

"Well!    What  do  you  say?" 

"Well,  /  haven't  got  the  heart,"  says 
Bourru. 

"Neither  have  I,"  avow  all  the  others. 

And  they  go  off,  these  sensitive  creatures, 
carrying  one  Boche  and  leaving  on  the  spot 
another  who  is  blowing  like  a  seal  behind  his 
gag. 


XVII 

THE  SADDEST  DUTY 

A  Letter  from  Madame  Char  el  to  Captain 

Lair  J  in  Command  of  a  Company  in  the 

— th  Regiment  of  Infantry 

MY  dear  friend,  I  am  so  happy  to 
know  that  my  son  is  under  your 
command.  IMy  poor  husband  loved 
you  so  much — and  I  have  had  many  proofs 
of  the  goodness  of  your  heart.  I  have  a  pre- 
sentiment that  you  will  bring  good  fortune 
to  my  dear  Luke.  You  know  how  devoted 
I  am  to  him,  for  he  is  the  only  reason  I  have 
for  living,  the  only  person  who  can  carry  on 
the  noble  work  his  father  left. 

A  moment  ago,  when  I  determined  to 

180 


THE  SADDEST  DUTY  181 

write  to  you,  I  was  intending  to  tell  you  that 
Luke  is  a  weak  and  sickly  boy — that  he 
would  give  better  service  in  some  sedentary 
employment  than  in  the  trenches.  But  I 
hesitated.  So  many  mothers  repeat  this  pa- 
thetic untruth.  And  yet  it  is  true,  Luke  is 
very  delicate — but  no,  I  am  unwilling  to 
say  more ;  I  know  that  your  scrupulous  con- 
science will  tell  you  what  is  just  for  him. 
I  know  that  you  will  spare  him  all  you  can 
— for  we  must  have  young  men  for  the 
France  of  to-morrow!  You  will  be  a  pro- 
tector to  him,  as  my  poor  husband  once  was 
to  you,  when  he  did  you  a  service  that  you 
will  remember — but  pardon  me,  I  am  be- 
ginning to  beg.  And  yet  when  I  think  of 
the  ghastly  things  that  might  happen,  when 
I  hear  my  beloved  son,  wounded,  dying,  call- 
ing to  me  in  the  night,  with  great  tears  in 

his  boyish  eyes Oh,  there  are  moments 

when  I  am  almost  beside  myself!  Tell  me 
that  you  will  protect  him,  promise  it  to  me !  I 
cannot  bear  to  think  of  his  dear  head  pierced 


182  BOURRU 

by  a  ball — it  is  too  horrible!  You  will  re- 
member how  pleasant  they  were,  those  even- 
ings long  ago  when  you  used  to  come,  as  a 
college-boy  of  eighteen,  to  spend  your  holi- 
days with  us ;  and  we  walked  along  the  river- 
bank  with  Luke  running  in  childish  joy  in 
and  out  among  the  wild  flowers.  .  .  .  But  I 
am  beside  myself.  I  hardly  know  what  I  am 
saying  to  you,  or  what  I  ought  to  say. 

No,  I  will  be  strong;  I  want  my  Luke  to 
do  his  duty  nobly,  like  the  fine  man  he  is. 
I  shall  be  so  proud  of  him.  And  I  have 
faith;  if  he  is  at  your  side,  I  am  sure  that 
death  will  not  dare  take  my  poor  boy  from 
me. 

Part  of  a  Letter  from  Private  Bourru  to  His 
Friend  Jolly,  in  the  Hospital 

.  .  .  And  it  was  some  fight,  believe  me. 
Ever  since  the  mine  went  off,  we  had  been 
there,  all  three  platoons,  in  the  hammer- 
shaped  trench — you  know,  the  one  on  the 


THE  SADDEST  DUTY  183 

left.  And  it  was  raining  dynamite,  believe 
me!  The  "easter-eggs,"  the  "turtles,"  the 
''rat-tails,"  and  the  "sand-bags"  were  com- 
ing down  like  hail.  All  the  same,  they 
couldn't  faze  us.  The  captain  had  sent  Cor- 
poral Taupin  down  in  the  dug-out  with  six 
fellows.  One  of  them  was  the  Charel  boy,  of 
the  class  of  '16 — you  remember  him? — he 
was  always  the  captain's  favorite,  and  a  nice 
lad,  too,  but  he'd  get  blisters  on  his  hands  the 
minute  he  touched  a  spade-handle.  It  w^as 
their  turn  in  the  trenches,  because  we  had 
been  there  last  time — guess  you  haven't  for- 
gotten that,  eh,  down  there  in  your  white 
sheets?  All  of  a  sudden  a  big  torpedo  went 
off  right  by  their  dug-out — Boom ! — and  an- 
other one  just  after  it,  and  then  another.  It 
was  enough  to  scramble  your  brains  like 
eggs.  Well,  the  blokes  in  the  dug-out  must 
have  thought,  "If  the  Bochcs  keep  sho\nng 
'em  at  us  like  that,  we're  gonners,"  because 
of  a  sudden  they  came  scrambling  out  of  the 
dug-out,  making  triple  time.     They  were 


184  BOURRU 

pretty  scared  rats,  at  that.  Mouchereau's 
eyes  were  sticking  out  of  his  head  like  a 
skinned  rabbit's,  and  the  Charel  kid  was  yell- 
ing, "Mamma!    Mamma!" 

But  what  did  they  do  but  run  right  into 
the  captain,  who  was  standing  at  the  en- 
trance to  the  trench?  You  know  the  cap- 
tain, eh  ?  He's  all  right,  but  he's  no  Sunday- 
school  teacher  when  there's  trouble  on. 

"Stop!"  he  yells;  "or  I'll  blow  your  brains 
out!" 

And  he  started  in  to  tell  'em  a  few  things 
— Lord,  you  ought  to  have  heard  it!  "Call 
yourselves  soldiers!  Running  away  like 
scared  rats !  I'm  ashamed  of  you !  I'd  never 
have  believed  it  of  the  boys  of  the  Twelfth — 
well,  I'll  turn  in  my  resignation,  I'm  dishon- 
ored !  .  .  .  Look  at  the  other  fellows,  they're 
laughing  at  you!  .  .  .  Aren't  you  the 
same  fellows  that  did  for  two  companies 
of  Boches  the  first  of  March?  Pull  your- 
selves together!  .  .  .  duty  .  .  .  sacrifice  .  .  • 
France  ..."  and  so  on,  and  so  on. 


THE  SADDEST  DUTY  185 

There's  no  use  talking,  at  times  like  that 
the  captain  knows  how  to  put  ginger  into 
you.  Well,  in  a  minute  those  blokes  were 
beginning  to  say:  "Pardon  us,  captain.  .  .  . 
We're  going  back.  .  .  .'* 

And  it  wasn't  ten  minutes  after  that  when 
the  Charel  boy  was  killed,  in  the  dug-out, 
by  a  shell  that  tore  him  to  pieces. 

As  he  was  the  captain's  pet  the  fellows 
carried  him  back  nicely  in  a  tent-cloth,  to 
please  the  "old  man,"  and  buried  him  at  the 
"Barricade." 

Fragments  from  the  Diary  of  Captain  Lair 

Luke  is  dead!  The  son  of  AHce  and  of 
that  fine  man  who  was  Pierre  Charel.  It  is 
liorrible!  And  I  am  tormented  by  a  doubt 
— I  must  put  my  words  on  paper  in  order 
that  I  may  try  to  know  my  mind.  Poor  boy  I 
He  was  such  a  pretty  child  when  I  used  to 
play  with  him  years  ago,  in  the  days  of  the 
long  vacations,  when  life  was  all  before  me 


186  BOURRU 

with  its  promises  of  love  and  happiness.  His 
poor  mother!  How  will  she  bear  it?  Her 
despair  will  be  horrible,  she  will  blame 
me.  ...  I  shall  never  dare  look  at  her 
again ! 

Oh !  I  need  to  take  refuge  on  the  heights 
of  the  ideals  to  which  I  have  devoted  my- 
self. There  I  may  find  rest.  Come,  let  me 
rise  above  the  tragic  things  of  the  hour.  Did 
I  not  do  my  duty?  All  the  logic  I  possess 
answers  in  the  affirmative.  I  am  an  officer 
of  the  army;  in  the  name  of  an  ideal  higher 
than  man  I  have  command  over  my  men. 
Their  strength  has  been  entrusted  to  me  that 
I  may  employ  it  as  best  I  can  in  the  interest 
of  our  native  land.  JNIy  duty  is  therefore  to 
control  that  strength  which,  by  a  law  of  na- 
ture, tends  to  exert  itself  in  the  line  of  the 
least  resistance.  My  men,  like  all  others, 
need  to  spur  their  wills  at  every  instant  in 
order  that  devotion  to  duty  may  triumph 
over  the  instincts  of  weariness  and  fear.  My 
role  is  to  aid  them  to  this  victory  over  them- 


THE  SADDEST  DUTY  187 

selves ;  and  I  fill  it  almost  always  by  appeal- 
ing to  their  noble  sentiments,  so  strong  and 
so  pure,  but  sometimes  .  .  .  Oh,  heavens, 
these  are  not  machines,  my  soldiers!  They 
are  men,  like  myself.  Like  all  men  they 
have  moments  when  the  animal  gets  the 
upper  hand — moments  which  later  on  they 
bitterly  regret — and  my  duty,  when  those 
moments  come,  is  to  sustain,  even  by  force 
if  necessary,  the  nobler  part  of  their  souls. 

By  employing  all  possible  means  I  must 
keep  them  from  committing  an  act  of  cow- 
ardice which  would  dishonor  them.  That  is 
what  I  did  to-day. 

I  ought  to  congratulate  myself.  The  of- 
ficer of  the  army  must  not  forget  that  he 
does  his  work  in  the  domain  of  brute  force; 
and  lie  who  yielded  to  pity  would  be  useless. 
iVt  this  moment  it  is  a  question  of  the  life 
or  death  of  our  race.  Individuals  do  not 
count ;  that  is  the  full  meaning  of  the  orders 
given  us  by  our  great  leaders  when  they  say : 
"You  must  fall  in  your  tracks  sooner  than 


188  BOURRU 

yield."  That  is  the  voice  of  our  whole  peo- 
ple. Oh,  what  a  detestable  sophist  seems 
the  philosopher  who  counselled  us  to  "con- 
sider man  not  as  a  means  but  as  an  end." 
There  is  but  one  end  to  make  certain  of,  at 
this  hour — the  life  of  the  French  nation, 
which  alone  will  make  possible  the  life  of  the 
individual.  Such  is  the  eternal  law,  and 
those  who  have  applied  it  in  times  gone  by 
appear  in  history  as  benefactors  of  human- 
ity. I  am  thinking  of  our  great  kings  and 
our  illustrious  generals.  .  .  . 

But  my  logic,  however  stern  it  may  be, 
cannot  prevent  my  heart  from  breaking  when 
I  think  of  poor  Luke.  He  was  such  a  fine 
fellow!  To-day  his  fear  got  the  best  of  him, 
but  what  of  that?  I  know  what  war  is; 
there  does  not  live  a  man  who  can  be  brave 
at  every  hour.  The  greatest  of  heroes  has 
his  hours  of  misgiving.  Just  yesterday,  did 
he  not  show  magnificent  bravery,  this  boy? 
And  he  was  so  devoted  to  me!  When  the 
company  would  pass  in  review  his  great 


THE  SADDEST  DUTY  189 

eyes  would  fasten  upon  nie  and  would  seem 
to  say:  "I  love  you,  my  captain,  my  old 
friend.  .  .  ."  And  to-morrow  I  must  ^v^ite 
to  tell  his  mother  that  he  is  dead ! 

"Ah,  it  is  easy  to  be  severe!"  think  the 
humble  people,  sometimes,  when  a  cruel  ty- 
rant bears  them  down.  But  who  will  ever 
tell  of  the  terrific  struggles  that  take  place 
in  the  hearts  of  certain  leaders  when  they  or- 
der their  subordinates  to  sacrilSce  themselves 
— those  secret  struggles  in  which  the  victory 
brings  such  grief!  "Be  firm!"  How  many 
of  the  people  who  repeat  the  words  have 
really  understood  their  terrible  meaning?  I 
mean  to  be  firm,  not  in  the  manner  of  the 
cowards  who  do  wrong  and  yet  save  their 
own  skins,  nor  in  the  manner  of  those  who 
command  sacrifices  merely  on  paper,  but  in 
the  manner  of  a  true  leader  who,  without 
weakening,  can  watch  the  blood  flowing  from 
the  veins  of  those  he  loves — because  duty 
demands  it. 

That  firmness  is  what  I  showed  to-dav. 


190  BOURRU 

My  mind  can  but  approve  it;  it  was  my 
duty;  I  shall  do  the  same  to-morrow,  if  it 
is  necessary.  But  in  this  hour,  alone  with 
myself,  since  the  tears  that  rise  to  my  eyes 
hinder  me  from  writing,  it  is  also  my  human 
privilege  to  weep. 


XVIII 


WAITING  FOR  A  MIXE  TO 
EXPLODE 

THERE  are  six  soldiers  and  a  cor- 
poral in  the  little  post  on  the  east 
— you  know,  the  one  that  stands  less 
than  twenty  yards  from  the  Boches.     For 
the  moment  all  is  perfectly  quiet  here. 

Bourru  has  just  explained,  for  the  hun- 
dredth time,  his  favorite  theory: 

"For  my  part,  I'd  rather  be  in  the  first 
line,  because  when  the  bombing  begins  it's 
always  the  second  line  that  gets  the  worst 
of  it.  All  you  have  to  do  out  here  is  to 
watch  the  bombs  going  over  your  head." 

And  since  things  are  so  quiet  all  the  men 
are  doing  much  as  they  please ;  whether  pol- 

191 


192  BOURRU 

ishing  their  rings,  or  reading  over  old  let- 
ters, or  scratching  their  backs,  or  looking  at 
the  clouds,  they  are  just  * 'killing  time." 

To  fill  out  the  scene  round  them  you  may 
imagine  piles  of  sandbags  forming  a  parapet 
such  as  the  illustrated  papers  have  shown 
you  often  enough. 

Suddenly  there  comes  a  sergeant  who  says 
in  low  tones — you  never  speak  out  at  this 
particular  post — "Say,  boys!  You've  got 
to  keep  your  eyes  open  for  the  next  few  min- 
utes. It  looks  as  if  the  Boches  were  going 
to  spring  a  mine  on  you — maybe  twenty  or 
thirty  yards  off,  nobody  knows  exactly.  As 
soon  as  it  goes  off  jump  into  the  hole  it 
leaves  and  wait  for  us — we'll  come  to  the 
rescue." 

"All  right,"  reply  the  men. 

Let  your  mind  rest  on  the  soldiers  a  mo- 
ment. You  know  them,  they  are  the  com- 
mon troopers  that  you  see  every  day — 
Bourru,  a  Burgundy  vinegrower;  Grossou, 
a  brick-mason  so  heavy  in  his  motions  that 


WAITING  FOR  A  MINE  TO  EXPLODE    193 

he  always  appears  stuck  in  his  mortar; 
Huguenin,  whose  cheeks  went  pale  during 
years  in  the  factory;  Richard,  a  blond  boy 
of  the  class  of  '15  who  receives  perfumed 
letters  from  his  pretty  mother;  Gruppeau, 
the  corporal,  a  farmer  from  the  Brie  country. 
Take  them  all  together,  they  are  just  ordi- 
nary human  creatures,  with  all  tlie  faults 
and  failings  of  common  humanity.  If  a 
moralist  were  to  assign  them  their  places  in 
a  scale  of  moral  values,  he  would  certainly 
not  put  them  above  the  average  of  their  fel- 
lowmen. 

But  a  sergeant  has  just  come  to  say  a 
dozen  words  to  them,  and  what  a  change! 
In  a  few  minutes  an  inferno  may  open  be- 
neath their  feet,  but  not  one  makes  a  motion 
to  get  away.    They  stand  here,  stoic,  mute. 

Do  you  understand  what  a  tremendous 
leap  they  have  just  made  upward  in  the  scale 
of  virtue  and  nobility?  A  moment  ago  they 
were  just  soldiers  wondering  when  their 
soup  would  come ;  now  they  are  heroes  look- 


194  BOURRU 

ing  without  a  quiver  into  the  face  of  death 
that  at  any  moment  may  accept  their  volun- 
tary sacrifice. 

This  sudden  mounting  to  the  heights  of 
moral  valor  is  the  reality  we  should  see  in 
the  sublime  drama  if  our  eyes  could  pene- 
trate beneath  appearances.  But  just  like 
myself,  in  all  probability,  you  see  nothing  in 
the  acts  of  these  men  except  little  gestures 
that  seem  insignificant  and  even  ridiculous. 
One  of  them  has  his  jaw  working  rapidly 
and  appears  to  have  difficulty  in  swallowing, 
another  has  let  fall  the  ring  that  he  was 
polishing  and  has  forgotten  to  pick  it  up, 
and  still  another  is  opening  his  mouth  and 
yawning  incessantly.  Grossou  is  mechanic- 
ally repeating: 

"This  will  blow  the  hd  off." 

Corporal  Gruppeau  speaks.  "Listen,"  he 
says,  "this  is  the  way  we'll  do  it.  See  that 
you've  got  plenty  of  cartridges,  and  fill  your 
sacks  with  grenades — j'^ou've  got  your  can- 
teens full,  eh?    When  the  thing  goes  off,  let 


WAITING  FOR  A  MINE  TO  EXPLODE    195 

every  man  be  ready  at  the  parapet.  If 
you're  blown  up — oh,  well,  you're  blown  up. 
But  if  you're  not  hurt,  run  for  the  hole. 
And  at  that  minute  we've  got  to  give  the 
Boches  all  the  hell  we  can  with  the  gren- 
ades." 

This  advice  given,  silence  reigns  over  the 
little  group.  Except  that  Vanneau,  who  has 
his  ear  to  the  ground,  maintains  he  can  hear 
muffled  sounds,  right  underneath  him. 

The  waiting  continues — and  how  long  the 
minutes  seem!  The  soldiers  are  sitting 
down,  with  their  rifles  between  their  knees; 
and  often  their  eyes  are  lowered  to  the 
ground,  as  if  they  could  already  see  the  first 
flames  of  the  red  terror.  Is  it  possible  that 
this  firm,  hard  soil  supporting  them  is  going 
to  fly  to  pieces  like  a  soap-bubble? 

As  I  look  steadily  into  the  eyes  of  Bourru 
I  seem  to  see  pictures  passing  before  them 
— a  peasant's  cottage  that  stands  dreaming 
beside  a  vineyard  overlooking  a  broad  plain ; 
a  hollow  willow  and  two  walnut-trees,  near 


196  BOURRU 

the  door,  which  lend  poetry  to  the  picture. 
On  the  steps,  half  hidden  by  the  shade  of 
the  trellis,  stands  Bourru's  mother,  with  the 
gentle  and  anxious  face  of  the  peasant 
woman,  always  disquieted  about  the  future. 
She  is  looking  out  into  the  dusk  to  see 
whether  her  son,  delayed  in  the  fields,  is  not 
yet  coming.  In  the  kitchen  the  soup  is  boil- 
ing. .  .  .  The  dear  old  mother!  Just  the 
other  day  she  sent  a  money-order,  piously 
pretending  that  "she  had  lots  too  much 
money  for  herself." 

"Poor  old  mother!"  thinks  Bourru.  "She 
will  be  all  alone  to  look  after  the  vines,  as 
in  the  first  years  when  she  was  a  widow.  To 
think  that  she  may  have  to  wait  every  night, 
all  through  her  old  age,  for  one  who  will  not 
have  come  back  from  the  war!  Her  little 
eyes  may  be  trembling  as  she  looks  in  vain 
toward  the  horizon  where  the  laborers  are 
returning,  and  the  soup  may  not  be  on  the 
fire,  because  she  may  lack  the  heart  to  pre- 
pare it." 


WAITING  FOR  A  MINE  TO  EXPLODE   197 

Bourru  looks  at  Grossou,  who  seems  mel- 
ancholy. 

''Come,  cheer  up,  old  boy!  Don't  worry 
about  it!  I'll  bet  you're  still  thinking  about 
your  Berrichonne" — for  that  is  Grossou's 
name  for  his  wife. 

"Oh,  I  ain't  worrying — but  it*s  good-by 
to  wifie  if  this  tiling  gets  you." 

Richard,  tbe  young  fellow  who  is  so  full 
of  life,  is  convinced  for  his  part,  though  with- 
out knowing  why,  that  their  little  post  won't 
be  blown  up. 

But  possibly  you  do  not  care  to  have  me 
go  on  with  tbis  story?  A  mine-explosion  is 
a  very  commonplace  affair — every  day  the 
communique  announces  a  few  of  them.  You 
have  a  good  picture,  have  you  not,  of  the 
possibilities?  Either  the  little  post  is  di- 
rectly above  the  mine,  and  in  tbat  case — turn 
your  eyes  away  from  the  ghastly  cauldron; 
or  the  tunnel  goes  a  little  to  the  side  of  it, 
and  if  so,  you  know  that  Bourru  and  his  com- 
rades are  going  to  plunge  into  tlie  pit.  .  .  . 


XIX 

OCCUPYING  THE  MINE  PIT 

THE  Boches  must  have  felt  rather 
foohsh  when  the  mine  exploded — 
for  the  "funnel'*  blew  out  hardly 
fifteen  yards  in  front  of  their  line,  and  their 
own  parapet  suffered  considerable  damage. 
This  often  happens.  You  must  remember 
that  the  miner  digs  his  tunnel  in  fear  of  be- 
ing buried  alive,  asphyxiated,  or  blown  up, 
and  he  hurries  to  get  through  his  perilous 
job.  If  his  superior  does  not  keep  a  careful 
eye  on  his  work,  the  mine  may  explode  far 
from  where  it  was  meant  to. 

The  Boches  were  astonished,  as  I  was 
saying;  but  that  is  merely  a  supposition,  for 
fear  is  infinitely  stronger  than  surprise. 

198 


OCCUPYING  THE  MINE  PIT       199 

In  precipitate  flight  they  have  abandoned 
the  part  of  the  trench  where  the  parapet  no 
longer  protected  them. 

Bourru  and  his  five  companions  are  al- 
ready crouching  in  the  bottom  of  their  new 
hole.  Ilugiienin,  at  the  noise  of  the  explo- 
sion, had  a  sudden  rush  of  memory  back  to 
a  tragic  moment  long  ago  when  the  red  flame 
of  a  catastrophe  wrought  havoc  in  his  fac- 
tory. Richard  closed  his  eyes  that  he  might 
not  see  the  blocks  of  stone  soaring  into  the 
air.  Grossou  buried  his  shoulder  still  more 
deeply  between  two  protecting  sand-bags. 
Still  another  man  iiiade  a  gesture  with  his 
hands  as  if  to  ward  off  the  flying  stones. 

For  this  was  certainly  a  perilous  moment 
in  the  great  drama — only,  the  actors  here 
were  too  much  hardened  to  the  risks  of  their 
profession  to  lose  their  wits  for  long. 

"Come  on,  boys!"  yelled  the  corporal. 

Hands  clutched  at  the  wall  of  sand-bags, 
and  bodies  leapt  up,  stumbled,  rose  again — 
and  a  moment  later  the  soldiers  reached  the 


200  BOURRU 

new  hole,  five  yards  in  diameter ;  for  a  heavy 
smoke  was  masking  their  movements. 

In  a  moment  their  new  work-shop  was 
being  organized. 

"Come  here,  you  two — pile  up  earth  on 
this  side  of  the  hole  to  make  a  parapet. 
You,  Bourru,  keep  your  eye  out  for  the 
Boches.  Richard!  Get  the  grenades  in 
place!" 

It  is  a  simple  task  the  men  have — to  stay 
in  the  "funnel"  until  their  comrades  in  the 
rear  can  dig  a  trench  to  connect  the  French 
line  with  the  hole  they  have  occupied.  As 
a  tactical  problem  it  is  child's  play;  but  re- 
member that,  from  this  minute  on,  the  six 
men  can  count  on  nothing  but  that  future 
connecting- trench  for  re-entering  their  lines, 
because  the  bullets  will  always  be  shaving 
the  ground  above. 

Now  that  the  last  wreaths  of  smoke  from 
the  explosion  are  rising  to  heaven,  the  Ger- 
mans try  to  get  back  into  their  trench.  It 
is  not  easy — the  trench  mortars  have  been 


OCCUPYING  THE  MINE  PIT       201 

turned  on  the  whole  position.  Grenades, 
petards,  torpedoes,  and  missiles  of  all  kinds 
are  cutting  the  air  in  such  numbers  that  one 
cannot  calculate  their  directions. 

The  six  soldiers  are  hard  at  work  in  their 
hole.  Every  thirty  or  forty  seconds  Rich- 
ard and  Iluguenin  throw  a  grenade  into  the 
opposing  trenches  to  keep  the  Bodies  from 
reoccupying  them.  Bourru  is  shooting 
without  a  pause.  Grossou  and  another  man 
are  building  up  a  parapet.  Not  a  man  is 
speaking  a  word.  If  you  are  listening  for 
heroic  words  you  are  losing  your  time,  and 
if  you  are  looking  for  men  to  strike  sublime 
attitudes,  you  must  go  elsewhere.  This  is 
nothing  but  a  work-shop,  where  six  good 
hands  are  straining  at  their  toil;  you  won't 
hear  anything  but  an  occasional  grunt,  a 
scolding  word,  an  oath — and  you  will  see 
faces  very  pale  or  very  red,  as  in  moments 
of  intense  effort. 

But  what  are  the  boys  behind  doing?  You 
cannot  hear  them  digging.  ...  If  only  the 


202  BOURRU 

trench  gets  finished  out  to  us  before  the 
Boches  come  back  in  front ! 

"Don't  you  worry  about  that,  boys !"  says 
the  corporal.  "You  get  your  job  done  and 
the  rest  is  easy." 

But  it's  no  fun,  all  the  same.  Grenades 
go  on  exploding  here  and  there,  not  far  from 
our  soldiers — one  can  see  that  they  have  been 
thrown  wild. 

"Well,  what  about  it?  Are  they  coming, 
those  fellows?"  asks  Richard. 

One  —  two  —  three  grenades  fall,  still 
nearer  to  the  hole,  and  the  fragments  go 
whistling  over  our  men.  And  then  comes  a 
surprise — the  grenades  are  coming  from  the 
French  side.  It  must  be  from  a  group  that 
does  not  know  we  have  taken  the  hole. 

"Stop!  Stop!  We're  holding  the  hole!" 
cry  out  six  soldiers. 

Their  comrades  recognize  their  mistake. 
Now  one  can  hear  them  digging. 

But  a  German  must  have  made  his  way 
into  the  abandoned  trench,  for  the  projec- 


OCCUPYING  THE  MINE  PIT       203 

tiles  from  that  side  begin  to  come  nearer. 
All  at  once  Grossou's  hand  flies  to  his  throat, 
in  an  effort  to  stop  a  hole  from  which  the 
blood  is  pouring;  but  he  sinks  to  the  ground 
without  a  word. 

A  moment  later  a  grenade  falls  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  group.  It  is  smoking — in  a  sec- 
ond it  will  burst.  ...  In  a  flasli  the  cor- 
poral has  seized  it  and  sent  it  back  .  .  .  none 
too  soon! 

They  must  chase  away  the  enemy  gren- 
ade-throwers who  have  installed  themselves 
within  easy  reach  in  front.  Iluguenin  rips 
out  an  oath,  rises  to  get  a  better  sight,  and 
in  five  seconds  he  hurls  into  the  Boche 
trenches  three  "spoon"  grenades — you  know, 
the  kind  that  explode  on  contact.  Take  my 
advice,  and  when  you  have  to  occupy  a  trench 
always  use  this  kind;  they  are  the  best.  But 
a  shower  of  bullets  has  passed,  and  Ilugue- 
nin is  now  squatting  in  the  bottom  of  the 
hole,  looking  at  his  arm  that  hangs  inert, 
with  blood  running  from  the  sleeve. 


204  BOURRU 

Thanks  to  him,  however,  the  enemy  gren- 
ade-throwers have  stopped  work — ^he  must 
have  got  some  of  them.  Only  those  who  are 
out  of  reach  continue  to  throw  projectiles, 
which  come  to  the  ground  some  yards  away 
from  us.    Richard  is  getting  nervous. 

"Come  on,  you  fellows,  hurry  up  with 
your  picks  and  spades.  We  can't  hold 
here " 

They  can  hear  the  digging  going  on  with 
redoubled  speed;  the  work  ought  to  be  well 
advanced.  This  thing  has  already  lasted 
thirty  minutes.  And  suddenly  Bourru  is 
saying:  "There  are  only  ten  grenades 
left!" 

They  must  be  used  sparingly,  in  order  to 
hold  out  at  least  fifteen  minutes  more. 
There  I  That  one  was  well  placed.  A  Boche 
had  showed  his  head,  and  the  missile  fell 
squarely  on  it. 

It  is  lucky  that  the  parapet  opposite  was 
torn  down,  for  but  for  that  the  Boches  would 
have  come  back  long  ago. 


OCCUPYING  THE  MINE  PIT       205 

"Attention!  Look  out!  Here's  a  tor- 
pedo coming  our  way!" 

The  thing  swings  down  through  the  air 
and  falls  a  few  yards  away,  with  a  formid- 
able explosion.  You  can  feel  your  lungs 
bursting,  your  head  going  empty,  and  some- 
thing like  a  fist-blow  at  the  base  of  your 
brain, — the  characteristic  sensation  from  the 
shock.  Red,  green,  and  yellow  lights  dance 
before  your  eyes.  Richard  has  suddenly 
leaped  erect,  with  a  wild  look — you  can  see 
that  the  commotion  is  driving  him  cr&zy.  In 
his  instant  of  madness  he  will  try  to  run — 
no  matter  where.  .  .  .  Bourru  has  just  time 
to  catch  him  by  the  foot  and  drag  him 
down.  .  .  .  None  too  soon!  A  shower  of 
bullets  swings  over  the  hole  like  the  blade 
of  a  guillotine. 

"Hurry  up,  boys!  Hurry  up!  There's 
only  three  of  us  left !" 

But  the  three,  without  relaxation,  continue 
shooting  and  throwing  grenades.  Finally 
the  wall  of  their  hole  begins  to  crumble — the 


206  BOURRU 

trench  has  been  dug.  Comrades  are  arriv- 
ing with  sacks  full  of  grenades.  The  hole 
will  be  fortified,  and  to-morrow  you  will 
read  in  the  paper:  "At  Vauquois,  the  usual 
battle  of  grenades." 


XX 


THE  SECRET  GARDEN 


YES,  it  is  true;  Bourru  never  speaks  of 
his  dreams  of  love,  and  more  than 
once  you  have  been  surprised  into 
saying,  "This  Bourru  must  have  the  heart 
of  an  old  bachelor."  But  there  are  subtle 
reasons  for  his  reticence.  In  order  to  under- 
stand  them  fully,  you  would  have  to  look 
into  our  soldier's  soul  at  the  moment 
when,  with  a  singular  expression,  he  is 
watching  his  comrades  writing  to  their  wives 
or  sweethearts.  Across  the  face  of  Bourru, 
at  these  moments,  there  passes  an  expres- 
sion of  something  like  bitter  pride;  you 
I^Wd  say  that  our  soldier  is  resisting  a  great 
Temptation,  that  his  heart  is  breaking  under 

207 


208  BOURRU 

it,  but  that  at  the  same  time  he  is  lifted  high 
in  his  own  respect. 

Let  me  tell  you  my  interpretation  of  this. 
Before  he  came  to  war,  Bourru,  like  the  oth- 
ers, knew  a  young  girl  in  his  village  the 
glance  of  whose  eye  used  to  set  his  heart 
beating.  It  began  very  long  ago,  he  no 
longer  remembers  when.  At  first  it  was  a 
tender  feeling  of  comradeship,  such  as  ex- 
isted between  other  boys  and  girls  in  the 
same  village;  but  very  soon  Bourru  had 
come  to  know  that  he  was  happier  on  the 
days  when  he  had  met  Suzanne  and  she  had 
smiled  at  him. 

Oh,  he  had  never  made  a  declaration  to 
her  I  In  the  countryside  one  is  prudent,  one 
weighs  matters  very  carefully  the  moment 
they  promise  to  become  serious.  Well,  Su- 
zanne was  the  daughter  of  a  well-to-do 
farmer ;  she  was  industrious  and  painstaking, 
she  would  be  a  good  wife  for  him ;  but  there 
was  no  hurry.  Bourru  was  only  twenty- 
eight,  and  before  he  married  he  wanted  to 


THE  SECRET  GARDEN  209 

acquire  a  little  piece  of  land  that  borders  the 
Maison-Rouge. 

After  this  purchase  had  been  made,  he 
might  see.  Meanwhile  he  contented  himself, 
each  time  he  saw  the  young  girl,  with  say- 
ing: 

"Ah,  there  you  go,  Suzanne!" 

"Just  so,  Louis,  I'm  going  to  drive  the 
cows  home." 

And  the  two  young  people  went  their 
ways  glad  at  heart.  Each  of  the  two  was 
secretly  sure  that  they  "were  suited  to  each 
other"  and  that  some  day  they  would  be 
married. 

The  war  is  on,  and  Bourru  is  at  Vau- 
quois.  At  the  beginning  our  soldier  said  to 
himself,  "There's  no  need  writing,  I'll  be 
back  in  three  months."  After  having  looked 
death  in  the  face,  Bourru  wanted  to  write  to 
Suzanne;  a  mad  desire  took  possession  of 
him  to  declare  his  love  to  the  young  girl  be- 
fore he  should  die.  But  a  feeling  of  pride 
restrained  hmi.     What!     Go  begging  for 


210  BOURRU 

love  when  at  any  minute  you  may  vanish 
from  the  face  of  the  earth — that  would  be 
silly!  *'If  I  tell  her  I  love  her/'  he  reasons, 
"she  will  love  me,  I  know  it;  and  then  if  I 
am  killed,  she  will  suffer,  and  that  will 
make  one  more  widow,  without  even  a  mar- 
riage." 

And  still,  how  he  is  tempted  to  write  love 
letters!  He  sees  others  doing  so  all  round 
him;  it  is  the  great  occupation,  in  the  hours 
of  rest,  of  all  the  soldiers.  One  has  only  to 
see  the  brilliant  ej^es  and  the  glowing  cheeks 
of  the  writers  in  order  to  guess  what  tender 
emotions  they  are  putting  into  words,  some 
of  them  with  painful  slowness,  others  at  fev- 
erish speed.  Ah!  To  have  a  wife  back  at 
home  whom  you  know  to  be  troubled,  giuev- 
ing,  revolted  at  the  cruel  fate  that  menaces 
you — what  a  comfort  it  is! 

"You  would  think,"  growls  Bourru  as  he 
watches  his  comrades,  "that  it  amuses  them 
to  know  that  a  woman  is  suffering  for 
them." 


I  THE  SECRET  GARDEN  211 

It  shall  not  be  said  that  he  had  recourse 
to  this  consolation  of  the  weak.  The  strong 
man,  though  overwhelmed  by  destiny,  does 
not  call  a  woman  to  his  aid.  There  is  in 
Bourru  the  instinct  of  the  ancient  knight 
who  made  it  a  point  of  honor  to  keep  all 
danger  at  a  distance  from  his  lady.  But  it 
is  hard ;  and  sometimes  when  Bourru's  mind 
reverts  to  Suzanne  his  eyes  grow  moist  at 
the  thought  of  the  phrases  she  might  write 
to  him.  Oh !  She  would  be  courageous,  be- 
yond a  doubt;  she  would  write:  "Be  brave, 
dear  Louis,  I  love  you  and  that  will  protect 
you  in  the  battle." 

"Yes,  it  is  true,"  he  would  think;  "if  I 
wrote  to  her,  she  would  answer  in  those 
words,  and  it  might  be  that  her  love  would 
bring  me  good  luck — who  knows  ?"  But  the 
strong  will  of  the  peasant  always  regained 
control:  "There's  no  good  in  making  a  widow 
before  her  wedding."  It  was  his  favorite 
^conclusion.  It  seemed  to  him  to  be  the  just 
0ne.    He  felt  that  he  had  no  right  to  move  a 


212  BOURRU 

woman's  heart  to  love  so  long  as  he  was 
under  daily  threat  of  death,  as  he  was  now. 
To  write  a  love-letter  to  Suzanne  would  be 
to  promise  her  a  man  when  perhaps  he  could 
only  give  her  a  corpse.  Thus  he  would  rea- 
son, with  his  hard-headed  peasant  logic. 
And  for  my  part  I  find  a  certain  nobility  in 
his  feelings ;  so  many  fellows  around  Bourru 
were  whimpering  for  the  pity  of  a  woman 
that  one  must  have  a  certain  admiration  for 
this  self-controlled  rustic.  You  can  feel  full 
well,  can  you  not,  what  treasures  of  love  my 
Bourru  is  thus  laying  up  in  his  heart?  Ah! 
he  does  not  expose  his  feelings,  this  hero  of 
mine;  his  peasant  ways  make  a  homely  but 
durable  cloak  for  them.  The  war  will  come 
to  its  end.  And  some  day,  perhaps,  Bourru 
will  say  to  his  Suzanne,  "I  love  you."  He 
will  not  tell  her  all  the  secret  reasons  that 
kept  him  from  an  avowal  during  the  war. 
It  would  be  too  difficult.  He  will  tell  her, 
and  keep  on  telling  her,  only  his  favorite 
phrase :  "I  didn't  want  to  make  a  widow  be- 


THE  SECRET  GARDEN  213 

fore  the  wedding";  but  he  will  feel  within 
him  a  great  sentiment  of  pride,  as  of  a  man 
who  has  succeeded  in  fulfilling  a  great 
duty. 


XXI 

THE  DAYS  OF  TUNNELS 

FOR  Bourru,  who  spent  four  years  at 
Vauquois,  there  is,  in  the  course  of 
the  war  at  this  position,  one  outstand- 
ing date;  namely,  that  which  marks  the  be- 
ginning of  the  war  underground. 

I  have  shown  you  the  hfe  of  the  soldier 
during  the  months  that  followed  the  capture 
of  the  hill.  The  men  installed  themselves  in 
the  position  with  great  haste,  which  meant, 
of  course,  with  only  modest  defences.  To 
protect  themselves  from  trench-mortars 
there  is  no  other  resource  but  to  run  from 
left  to  right,  unless  one  prefers  the  illusion 
of  a  tent-cover.  So  the  men  came  to  live 
under  the  obsession  that  the  heavens  were 

214 


THE  DAYS  OF  TUNNELS  215 

a  perpetual  menace.  If  they  could  but  in- 
terpose masonry,  earth,  wood-work,  between 
themselves  and  the  sky  whence  the  bombs 
rained,  what  a  relief  it  would  be!  Around 
tlie  month  of  July,  1915,  there  was  a  begin- 
ning at  digging  tunnels.  They  were  merely 
narrow  holes  sunk  into  the  hill,  but  with 
what  a  zeal  the  men  worked  at  them! 

They  soon  grew  large  enough  to  hold  en- 
tire companies.  And  then  one  breathed 
more  easily.  The  men  would  take  their 
places  in  the  tunnels  whenever  they  were 
not  in  active  service,  and  so  they  were  pro- 
tected from  all  danger.  With  from  six  to 
ten  yards  of  earth  above  them  they  could 
sleep  in  peace,  heat  up  their  soup,  or  play 
cards  by  candle-light. 

For  those  who  love  the  contrasts  of  life 
this  existence  offers  notable  examples,  run- 
ning all  the  way  from  extreme  peril  to  abso- 
lute security.  Thus,  you  are  on  sentinel 
duty  in  the  first  line,  and  a  bombardment 
begins.    Crouching  amid  the  sand-bags  you 


216  BOURRU 

await  the  hour  which  will  mark  the  end  of 
your  turn.  The  shells  are  falling  right  and 
left  of  you ;  every  minute  you  hear  one  com- 
ing from  afar,  from  the  direction  of  Mont- 
faucon.  First  there  is  a  detonation  in  the 
distance — the  firing  of  the  gun — then  a  sin- 
ister whistling,  and  finally  the  explosion 
upon  arrival,  which  shakes  the  whole  hill. 
This  particular  shell  was  not  for  you.  But 
the  next?  And  the  others  that  will  follow? 
Yet  there  is  nothing  to  do  but  wait.  Why 
move?  The  place  where  you  go  to  may  be 
the  point  where  the  next  shell  will  fall.  Re- 
signed, you  remain  motionless,  but  with  what 
an  emotion  in  your  heart!  No  matter  how 
long  he  has  been  at  Vauquois,  for  every  man 
these  minutes  are  minutes  of  terror.  No, 
pardon  me,  that  is  not  the  right  word.  The 
first  time,  under  the  shells,  you  feel  an  ex- 
treme horror  that  paralyses  all  thought; 
then,  thanks  to  experience,  the  fear  becomes 
more  spiritualized,  and  you  are  something 
better  than  so  much  flesh  shaken  by  fright; 


THE  DAYS  OF  TUNNELS  217 

you  are  a  man,  who  with  a  clear  mind  says 
to  himself: 

^'There's  no  chance  for  me  to  escape  this 
time — their  fire  seems  too  well  directed." 

And  your  ear  follows  the  whistling  shells, 
and  your  mind  estimates  the  destination,  al- 
ways nearer  and  nearer  to  you. 

But  two  hours  have  slipped  away;  from 
the  connecting-trench  a  comrade  emerges — 
you  are  relieved  I  You  leap  down  the  slope, 
and  with  a  bound  you  are  in  the  tunnel.  Oh, 
what  relaxation  for  mind  and  body  I  Here 
there  is  no  more  danger;  you  can  go  to  sleep 
in  peace  without  even  a  thought  for  the 
comrade  who  has  taken  your  place.  What 
good  would  it  do  to  pity  him?  That  would 
not  keep  the  shells  from  coming  on. 


XXII 

A  SESSION  WITH  THE  TRENCH- 
MORTARS 

"  ^^^  OME,  tell  us  about  your  last  gren- 
1  J  ade-battle !"  says  some  good  friend 
to  a  man  on  furlough.  "It  must 
have  been  great  fun,  eh?  Wliat  a  game  it 
must  be,  throwing  bombs  and  gi-enades 
across  trenches!  On  the  whole,  it  must  be 
very  much  like  a  fight  with  snow-balls  be- 
tween gamins,  I  suppose — and  they  say 
that  the  poilus  are  just  big  happy  chil- 
dren!" 

Oh,  that  legend  of  the  merry  poilu,  how  it 
enrages  us!  Heavens,  yes!  We  make 
jokes,  but  must  one  keep  laboriously  insist- 
ing that  the  witticisms  of  the  soldier  under 

218 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS    219 

fire  do  not  arise  from  a  good  digestion,  but 
simply  from  a  resolution  that  defies  death? 
Listen,  I  will  tell  you  about  the  last  bomb- 
ing that  Bourru  had  a  part  in.  You  must 
not  expect  any  jokes,  but  perhaps  that  will 
make  you  appreciate  more  fully  the  merit  of 
the  men  who  have  the  courage  to  make  jokes 
at  such  moments. 

It  is  ten  o'clock  at  night.  Bourru  is  stand- 
ing sentinel  in  the  first  line,  twenty  yards 
from  the  German  trench.  All  is  quiet.  Tlie 
winter  night  is  dark  and  damp.  The  soldier 
is  waiting — in  full  knowledge  that  for  the 
last  three  months  not  a  night  has  passed  in 
quietude.  The  bombanhnent  is  going  to 
rage,  and  he  knows  it.  When  ?  No  one  can 
I^Br.  In  a  few  minutes  or  in  a  few  hours? 
'^R  one  knows.  Neither  tactics  nor  strategy 
^^ynvolved  in  this  matter.  It  is  not  a  thing 
l^pnned  in  the  brain  of  some  general.  What 
will  decide  the  fatal  minute  will  be  the  ca- 
price  of  some  man  who  suddenly  feels  the 
desire  to  kill  awakening  in  his  breast.  .  .  . 


220  BOURRU 

At  a  quarter  past  ten  there  is  a  detonation 
in  the  enemy  lines. 

"There  she  goes,"  murmurs  Bourru. 

And  if  you  could  see  him  you  would  no- 
tice that  he  has  turned  paler.  Immediately, 
there  are  other  detonations.  Those  are  tor- 
pedoes, bombs,  petards,  that  rise  into  the 
sky  and  streak  it  with  luminous  lines.  Over 
the  six  hundred  yards  of  the  hill-top  these 
gleams  spring  up  incessantly — that  is  a 
trench  bombardment.  It  is  as  if  a  mon- 
strous dragon,  such  as  you  see  in  mediseval 
pictures,  had  just  risen  in  fury  to  dart 
flashes  from  his  throat. 

Bourru  looks  and  listens  with  all  atten- 
tion. He  must  be  on  his  guard  lest  the 
enemy  take  advantage  of  the  noise  and  com- 
motion to  launch  a  surprise  attack.  But 
Bourru  is  also  thinking  of  protecting  his 
own  skin.  Thinking,  did  I  say?  No,  he  is 
not  thinking,  it  is  only  his  instinct  that  has 
long  been  engaged  in  the  struggle  against 
death;  Bourru  is  just  obeying  the  reflex  mo- 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS    221 

tions  suggested  by  his  sensations  of  sight 
and  sound. 

Does  a  luminous  streak  cut  into  the  sky 
from  the  direction  of  the  enemy?  It  is  a 
torpedo  going  up.  Like  a  comet  it  trails 
behind  it  particles  of  fire,  but,  once  arrived 
at  the  top  of  its  curve,  the  luminous  trail 
grows  thin,  then  vanishes.  After  tliat  one 
hears  the  thing  tearing  the  air  as  it  falls  out 
of  the  black  sky.  Where  is  it  going  to  fall? 
Your  eyes  search  vainly  in  the  dark  for  some 
place  to  run  for  protection  ...  to  the 
right  ...  to  the  left? 

Boom!  .  .  .  Whew! 

The  torpedo  has  fallen  at  least  sixty  yards 
away.  The  missiles  from  the  trench-mortars 
are  like  midges  flying  through  the  air.  Only 
the  burning  fuses  mark  their  passage  as  they 
go.  They  are  flying  high  over  Bourru's 
head. 

But  the  grenades  and  petards,  what 
treacherous  pests!  You  cannot  see  them. 
You  simply  hear  them  light — Spat! — like  a 


222  BOURRU 

stone  falling  by  your  side,  and  before  you 
have  time  to  think — Bang!  Zim!  Bow! — 
they  burst  and  whistle  and  squirt  smoke  with 
a  smell  like  ether  which  rasps  in  your  throat. 

Bourru  resigns  himself  to  it.  Pressed 
close  between  two  sand-bags,  he  waits.  .  .  . 

Ah,  where  are  they,  those  good  old  times 
when  trench  bombing  went  on  only  by  day- 
light? In  those  days  the  monstrous  enter- 
prise slept  during  the  nights.  Not  that  bom- 
bardment by  day  was  at  all  agreeable,  but 
there  was  one  advantage  in  it.  You  could 
see;  you  could  watch  the  infernal  machines 
that  streaked  down  toward  you  and  guess 
where  they  were  going  to  fall.  Then,  ac- 
cording to  need,  you  could  run  from  right  to 
left,  with  your  head  lifted  to  the  sky. 

But  what  is  this?  Four  soldiers  have  just 
gone  by,  running  into  the  connecting-trench. 
They  are  new  fellows.  Instead  of  standing 
stoically  in  their  places,  under  the  storm, 
what  have  the  fools  done  but  try  to  run  to 
a  safe  place,  as  one  would  do  in  broad  day- 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS    223 

light?  They  thought  a  torpedo  was  coming 
at  them.  And  now  in  their  halhicination 
their  eyes  see  another  coming  on  the  left — 
and  a  new  chase  follows  in  the  reverse  direc- 
tion. They  go  by  again  like  a  herd  stam- 
peded. 

Thunder!  One  of  tlic  cowards  has  tripped 
over  his  gun.  lie  is  rolling  in  the  mud  and 
his  companions  are  running  over  him  in  the 
dark. 

"Hey,  you  blanked  idiots!"  cries  Bournj; 
"stand  still  and  keep  (piiet!'* 

What  imprudence!  One  must  never  yell 
in  the  first  line.  Bourru*s  angry  exclama- 
tion has  attracted  the  attention  of  the 
Bodies,  and  they  start  raining  grenades  on 
the  point  where  the  men  were  wrangling. 

Bourru  gives  them  a  warm  reply.  One 
of  the  scared  fellows,  encouraged  by  his 
example,  comes  to  his  aid,  and  then  an- 
other. Grenades,  rat-tails,  turtles, — every- 
thing is  hurling,  howling,  bursting.  What 
a  racket! 


224  BOURRU 

Finally  the  enemy  bombers  become  quiet, 
but  the  trench-mortars  continue.  Huddled 
up  in  the  sand-bags,  our  men  have  met  no 
harm,  excepting  one  who  has  "caught"  a 
piece  of  shell  in  the  cheek. 

The  thing  has  been  going  on  for  an  hour 
now,  and  the  bombing  has  been  intense.  If 
you  breathe  you  swallow  as  much  dust  as 
smoke,  and  it  makes  you  sneeze.  A  thou- 
sand bells  ring  in  your  ears. 

While  Bourru  and  the  other  sentinels  pro- 
tect themselves  as  best  they  can  in  the  first 
line,  their  comrades  of  the  company  are  but 
fifty  yards  to  the  rear,  in  a  tunnel. 

Imagine  a  cavern  sunk  into  the  hill  like  a 
long  gallery.  At  the  entrance  to  the  tunnel 
the  roof  of  protecting  earth  is  quite  thin, 
but  at  the  other  end  the  resting  men  have 
twenty  or  thirty  yards  of  earth  above  their 
heads.  Here  they  are  quiet,  indifferent  to 
the  bombing,  but  by  no  means  comfortable. 
Heavens,  no!  Crowded  together,  the  men 
have  not  even  room  to  lie  down ;  the  water  is 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS     225 

trickling  down  the  beams  that  support  the 
earth,  and  they  walk  in  thick  mud.  To  rest 
themselves  the  soldiers  have  sat  down  on 
their  packs,  huddled  up,  dozing  with  their 
heads  on  one  another's  shoulders.  A  watch- 
man is  stationed  at  the  entrance  to  the  tun- 
nel, ready  to  transmit  the  call  for  help  from 
the  sentinels  in  the  first  line. 

Outside,  the  trench-mortars  are  raging. 

"Look  out!"  says  Bourru — "there's  one 
coming  for  us  I" 

It  is  a  torpedo  showing  its  luminous  trail 
exactly  in  front  of  one  of  them.  Flat  on  the 
bottom  of  the  trench,  face  to  the  ground, 
eyes  and  ears  stopped  by  their  hands,  the 
men  wait.  .  .  .  Tliere  comes  a  horrible  de- 
tonation— a  hundred  pounds  of  high  explo- 
sive I  Every  muscle  is  contracted  to  make 
still  smaller  the  body  that  crouches  ready  to 
howl  with  pain. 

"Ah!  Ah!"  pants  Bourru,  lifting  his 
iiead.  "That  must  have  fallen  on  the  tunnel 
of  our  company." 


226  BOUIIRU 

But  this  is  no  time  for  going  to  see;  and 
anyway,  the  tunnel  is  safe. 

The  hour  for  our  relief  has  passed — and 
the  others  have  not  come.  Bourru  is 
troubled.  Can  an  accident  have  befallen  the 
tunnel? 

Taking  advantage  of  a  quiet  moment,  our 
soldier  goes  down  the  fifty  yards  of  trench 
that  separate  him  from  the  shelter.  But 
where  is  the  entrance?  The  ground  is  torn 
up — the  trench  is  ruined.  Groping,  Bourru 
advances.  Ah,  that  is  it!  The  torpedo  fell 
on  the  tunnel.  But  still, — the  tunnel  cannot 
have  caved  in  from  one  end  to  the  other.  .  .  . 
Bourru  picks  out  his  way,  crawling.  The 
torn  earth  smells  of  ether,  and  it  seems  as  if 
an  odor  of  blood  hovered  round  it,  too.  .  .  . 

Finally  Bourru  finds  a  fissure  in  the 
ground,  revealing  a  dim  light  from  within. 
He  makes  his  way  into  the  tunnel.  Now 
that  he  is  underground  he  can  take  out  his 
electric  flashlight. 

Horror!     One  of  his  comrades — the  one 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS     227 

who  was  watching  at  the  tunnel's  entrance 
— stands  erect,  stuck  fast  between  two  posts. 
The  concussion  of  the  torpedo,  bursting  at 
the  very  entrance,  had  hurled  him  with  such 
violence  that  his  bruised  and  mangled  body 
is  jammed  fast  into  the  wall,  between  the 
posts.  His  clothes  are  torn  to  rags,  and 
the  body  has  become  like  some  shapeless 
bundle  that  is  stuffed  into  a  hole  to  keep 
out  the  air.  Notliing  has  struck  him; 
the  concussion  alone  has  ripjK'd  his  vitals 
apart. 

In  the  interior  of  the  cavern  the  effects  of 
the  explosion  have  been  less  violent,  thoup[h 
still  sufficient  to  tear  down  joists,  and  throw 
everything  into  confusion,  and  set  off,  by 
concussion,  a  supply  of  grenades. 

A  number  of  men  are  wounded.  A  thick 
cloud  of  dust  hangs  in  the  vault,  and  is 
scarcely  pierced  by  the  gleam  of  a  candle. 
Some  men  are  sitting  motionless,  with  hag- 
gard eyes;  others  are  groping  about,  caring 
for  the  wounded ;  one  is  shaking  his  head  as 


228  BOURRU 

a  token  that  he  can  no  longer  hear,  that  his 
ear-drums  are  burst. 

Fortunately  Bourru  remembers  the  pick- 
axe, which  works  by  compressed  air,  and  is 
used  for  digging  tunnels.  He  opens  the 
valve,  and  the  air  escapes  with  a  burst,  car- 
rying the  dust  away  on  its  current. 

But  I  have  told  enough  of  this  tale.  I  am 
afraid  you  will  take  me  for  a  reporter  "play- 
ing up"  the  story  of  a  catastrophe  in  order 
to  make  more  copy. 

Yes,  indeed,  our  war  is  like  a  series  of 
factory  catastrophes,  and  we  are  quite  aware 
that  we  are  lacking  in  "heroic  grandeur." 
What  is  more  banal  than  a  session  with  the 
trench-mortars? 

That  is  certainly  Bourru's  feeling  about  it. 
Listen  to  the  man  himself,  the  morning  after, 
as  he  sits  quietly  at  the  mouth  of  a  tunnel, 
warming  himself  in  the  pale  rays  of  a  Jan- 
uary sun,  and  talking  of  the  accident  of  the 
night  before. 

"There's  no  use  talking,  all  things  consid- 


A  SESSION  WITH  THE  MORTARS     229 

ered  the  place  is  a  sight  better  than  it  used 
to  be  six  months  ago.  In  those  days  you 
had  to  spend  your  time  running  up  and 
down  the  trench  to  get  away  from  the  bombs. 
Now  you've  got  shelters,  you've  got  tunnels. 
Of  course,  there's  an  accident  once  in  a  while, 
but  in  general  it's  all  serene." 


XXIII 

A  DAY  UNDERGROUND  IN  THE 
TIME  OF  THE  MINES 

ONLY  the  night  before  two  sappers 
had  been  brought  out  from  a  min- 
ing tunnel  asphyxiated  by  gases 
that  had  come  over  them  stealthily  from  no 
one  knew  where.  It  is  very  strange,  but 
from  being  continually  mined,  hollowed  out, 
and  dug  up,  as  from  the  daily  explosions  of 
cheddite  inside  the  hill,  the  earth  of  it  is 
saturated  with  toxic  vapors.  There  are  fis- 
sures that  belch  smoke  at  you,  coming  from 
heaven  knows  where,  and  there  are  pockets 
of  gas  formed  which  some  fine  day  will  break 
loose — and  the  result  is  that  in  the  under- 
ground shelters  you  often  find  yourself  dis- 

230 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND  231 

comfited,  or  even  asphyxiated,  before  you 
have  time  to  say  a  word.  Bourru  is  upset 
by  it.  Ever  since  there  have  been  tunnels 
at  Vauquois  he  has  found  hfe  unendurable 
there.  As  for  taking  tlie  trench  bombs  as 
they  came,  in  the  first  line,  that's  the  same 
thing  at  Vauquois  or  anywhere  else ;  but  now 
there's  no  way  of  staying  quiet,  for  the 
blasted  sappers  have  gone  and  invented  the 
devil's  own  war! 

For  instance,  a  moment  ago  Bourru  was 
sleeping  quite  peacefully  in  the  tunnel — he 
had  found  a  fine  way  to  rest  easy.  You 
know  what  the  scene  is  like,  I  suppose?  The 
tunnel  is  narrow,  about  a  yard  and  a  half 
wide,  so  that  the  roof  may  resist  the  bom- 
bardments as  firmly  as  possible.  You  go 
down  into  it  by  a  flight  of  steps.  If  you 
have  to  sleep  inside  it,  your  first  idea,  of 
course,  would  be  to  stretch  yourself  along 
the  wall.  But  that  won't  do.  Take  this 
lamp  (it's  an  old  tin  in  which  somebody  has 
put  a  wick  and  camphorated  oil,  intended  to 


232  BOURRU 

kill  lice)  and  look  at  the  ground.  You  see 
it  is  covered  with  water,  and  you  can't  go  to 
bed  in  that!  Do  as  Bourru  does.  He  has 
managed  to  place  a  plank  near  the  steps  at 
the  entrance,  with  one  end  resting  on  a  step 
and  the  other  held  up  by  two  wires  from  the 
ceihng.  In  this  way  you  can  defy  the  water 
on  the  floor,  though  heaven  knows  you  can 
do  nothing  against  that  which  trickles  from 
the  ceiling.  You  must  be  resigned  to  letting 
the  drops  fall  on  your  nose.  Oh,  well,  what 
of  it?  In  this  comfortable  posture  Bourru 
would  take  his  sleep — without  turning,  of 
course,  for  fear  of  a  tumble. 

But  for  the  last  half -hour  his  slumbers 
have  been  troubled.  As  he  went  to  sleep  he 
was  thinking: 

"If  only  the  gas  doesn't  get  loose  in  the 
passage!  With  these  mysterious  enemies, 
you  never  know  what  will  happen." 

So  now  he  is  dreaming.  He  seems  to  have 
a  bag  of  sand  on  his  chest,  and  finds  it  hard 
to    breathe.  .  .  .  Suddenly    the    sand-bag 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND 


233 


turns  to  vapor,  the  place  is  full  of  smoke,  he 
is  stifling,  and  a  numbness  is  making  his 
limbs  heavy  and  lifeless.  ...  In  his  semi- 
consciousness, the  sleeper  suspects  what  has 
happened.  The  gas !  The  gas  has  come  and 
he  cannot  get  away!  He  is  going  to  die 
there.  .  .  .  What  tough  luck!  .  .  ,  But 
there's  no  way  to  move  these  leaden  arms  and 
legs.  .  .  . 

Bourru  is  jostled  by  one  of  his  fellows 
moving  on  the  steps,  and  he  comes  to  him- 
self in  reality.  Sure  enough,  there  is  smoke 
around,  but  it  comes  only  from  the  lamp. 
It's  another  trick  of  that  scoundrel  Fouge- 
res,  who  has  put  foot-grease  in  the  lamp  in- 
stead of  oil,  and  it  smokes!  Wide  awake, 
and  in  a  bad  humor,  our  soldier  growls  at 
the  man  who  is  rubbing  against  him: 

"Say,  can't  you  be  a  little  careful  when 
you  go  by?    You  woke  me  up." 

*'See  here,  you  bloke,"  replies  the  other,  in 
surly  tones,  "I'm  carrying  a  bag  of  dirt,  and 
if  you  like  I'll  just  drop  it  on  you." 


234<  BOURRU 

These  men  carrying  sacks  of  earth  keep 
going  by,  pressing  against  the  sleepers,  step- 
ping over  them.  But  what  remedy?  We 
are  still  digging  at  the  other  end  of  the  tun- 
nel, and  the  compressed-air  shovel  is  scratch- 
ing away  to  enlarge  the  cavern.  The  earth 
it  shears  off  must  be  carried  away. 

"A  man  can't  breathe  in  here!"  cries 
Bourru  to  his  companions. 

True,  but  in  the  tunnels  you  must  resign 
yourself  to  that.  You  can  either  stay  near 
the  mouth  and  endure  a  fierce  draught,  or 
you  can  content  yourself  with  the  heavy, 
stagnant,  vicious  air  farther  in.  The  latter 
solution  is  usually  adopted;  and  that  is  the 
reason  why,  when  you  look  at  Vauquois  from 
a  distance,  you  see  a  kind  of  mist  rising  from 
points  here  and  there.  The  points  are  the 
mouths  of  the  tunnels,  and  the  mist  is  the 
vapor  from  the  respiration  of  the  men  who 
live  inside  the  hill. 

The  Boches  are  fully  aware  of  this  and 
they  are  constantly  shooting  at  the  points 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND  235 

whence  these  mists  arise,  hoping  to  hit  sol- 
diers entering  or  leaving  the  tunnel.  The 
men  are  used  to  it.  Nevertheless,  every  time 
he  has  to  go  out,  Bourru  clenches  his  fists, 
lowers  his  head,  and  rushes  fast — very  fast 
— for  the  opening  that  leads  to  the  connect- 
ing-trench. 

Bourru  suffers  from  still  another  kind  of 
dread  in  the  tunnel,  but  should  I  ever  be  able 
to  make  you  feel  the  subtle  anxiety  in  which 
it  constantly  hovers  round  his  heart?  You 
are  well  aware  that  a  month  or  so  ago  a 
Boche  mine  exploded  on  the  west  side  of  the 
hill,  a  mine  of  at  least  four  tons  of  explosive. 
It  made  a  crater  a  hundred  yards  across  and 
thirty  deep.  Half  a  company  of  our  men 
disappeared.  And  that  was  not  the  first 
thing  of  the  kind.  It  is  said  that  the  Bodies 
have  two  more  mines  of  the  same  size  to  set 
off,  one  in  the  center  and  another  toward  the 
west.  Of  course  the  engineers  on  our  side 
are  paying  them  in  their  own  coin.  Every 
day  you  can  hear  explosions,  but  that  is  no 


236  BOURRU 

surety  that  the  Boche  mines  are  not  still 
there;  and  they  are  on  your  mind  all  the 
time. 

Back  in  the  rest  cantonment,  even,  this 
idea  was  already  haunting  our  men.  Among 
their  groups  you  could  hear  snatches  of  con- 
versation like  this : 

"Well,  we'll  be  on  the  east  in  the  next 
shift,"  Fougeres  is  saying  to  Bourru;  "and 
we'll  do  some  high  flying,  you  bet!  It'll 
look  funny.  ..." 

"Don't  you  worry,"  puts  in  Lachard. 
"It's  all  hot  air  about  that  mine — I  was  talk- 
ing with  some  chaps  in  the  Engineers,  and 
they  told  me  there  was  no  mine  there." 

"Don't  you  believe  it,"  says  Chomel. 
"I'm  on  the  good  side  of  the  secretaries  at 
headquarters,  and  they  told  me  that  some 
Boche  prisoners  had  said  the  mine  was  all 
ready." 

Once  in  a  while,  at  night,  a  rumor  would 
run  about  the  captonment  like  a  trail  of 
burning  gunpowder:  the  mine  had  gone  off. 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND  237 

and  it  was  the  — th  regiment  that  caught  it. 
Of  course  the  men  would  pity  their  com- 
rades, but — well,  so  long  as  fate  had  decided 
that  this  should  fall  to  their  lot  .  .  .  Ah, 
but  the  rumor  was  false,  nothing  had  ex- 
ploded. 

"Oh,  well!"  thinks  Bourru,  "here  we  are, 
now,  in  the  tunnel;  if  she  blows  up,  so  much 
the  worse !" 

It  is  a  queer  thing  that,  whereas  before 
going  up  into  the  line  the  mine  was  the  sub- 
ject of  every  conversation  and  more  than 
one  face  used  to  pale  when  it  was  referred 
to,  now  the  thing  is  very  seldom  mentioned. 
Every  one  of  these  men  resorts  to  the  sys- 
tem of  defence  classical  in  psychology — un- 
able in  reality  to  suppress  the  latent  danger, 
they  suppress  it  in  thought,  or  rather  make- 
believe  to  suppress  it,  by  not  giving  it  ex- 
pression. But  it  nevertheless  continues  to 
act  upon  the  mind  of  Bourru;  it  is  one  of 
those  ideas  that  live  on  within  you,  at  once 
hidden  and  present,  and  give  their  imprint  to 


238  BOURRU 

all  your  emotions,  all  your  thoughts,  even  to 
those  that  are  most  unrelated.  A  man 
threatened  by  a  mine  against  which  he  is 
powerless  is  like  a  poor  cardiac  sufferer  who 
goes  through  life  saying  to  himself:  "My 
aneurism  may  break  at  any  moment."  And 
this  puts  as  somber  tints  into  the  verdure  of 
the  spring  as  into  the  gold  of  autumn. 

But  whatever  his  state  of  mind,  you  must 
not  imagine  that  Bourru  is  going  to 
display  his  feelings  to  everybody  else. 
Heavens,  no!  When  there  is  some  chance 
reference  to  the  mine,  he  makes  merry  about 
the  sensations  he  hopes  to  have  as  he  flies 
through  the  air  straddling  a  chunk  of  earth. 
And  everybody  displays  the  riches  of  his 
imagination  in  embroidering  the  theme. 

It  is  true,  as  I  said,  that  there  is  very  little 
talk  of  the  mine.  Nevertheless,  at  every 
moment  there  is  some  soldier  who,  by  acci- 
dent,— oh,  entirely  by  accident! — ^has  just 
heard  a  noise — right  there,  under  his  feet. 
Of  course  it  can't  be  anything,  he  tells  you; 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND  239 

still,  one  might  as  well  listen  with  all  his 
ears.  Nobody's  afraid,  of  course,  but  if  you 
heard  anything,  you  ought  to  tell  the  fellows 
in  the  engineers,  they  would  be  glad  to 
know.  .  .  . 

Every  one  stops  talking  and  listens. 

"I  hear  somebody  tapping,"  says  one  man. 

"Oh,  get  out!"  says  another.  "That's  the 
bombs  above." 

But  they  go  off,  all  the  same,  to  tell  the 
lieutenant,  who  will  tell  Captain  Laignier 
of  the  engineers,  the  great  master  sapper  of 
Vauquois.  And  invariably  Captain  Laig- 
nier says: 

"I  assure  you  there  is  no  danger." 

Yes,  but  if  there  were,  would  he  say  so? 

"Oh,  come  on  and  let's  play  cards!"  says 
Lachard.  "That's  better  tlian  tliinking  for- 
ever about  that  danmed  mine.  It'll  drive  us 
crazy." 

And  it  is  quite  true  that  a  sergeant  did  go 
crazy  the  other  day.  He  was  running  to  the 
lieutenant  every  five  minutes  to  say  that  the 


240  BOURRU 

mine  was  going  to  explode.  They  sent  him 
away. 

"You  said  it,"  mutters  Bourru;  "I'm 
through  thinking  about  that  mine." 

He  keeps  repeating  the  sentence  to  him- 
self and  his  arm  makes  violent  motions,  as 
a  man  makes  threatening  gestures  to  drive 
away  a  tramp  who  is  bent  on  climbing  over 
the  garden  fence. 

Then  all  at  once  the  pillars  of  the  cave 
begin  to  shake  and  creak  as  if  a  shock  from 
the  right  was  throwing  them  down — and 
then  another  shock  drives  them  back  from 
the  left.  The  candles  have  gone  out.  .  .  . 
It's  the  mine  exploding!  Every  man  has 
huddled  himself  into  a  ball,  with  throat 
straining  and  shoulders  arched  to  resist  the 
debris.  Two  other  shocks,  one  from  the 
right,  the  other  from  the  left,  follow  the  first ; 
then  the  oscillations  diminish  in  force,  and 
nothing  has  yet  caved  in.  Candles  are 
lighted  again  and  the  men  look  at  each 
other. 


A  DAY  UNDERGROUND 


24il 


"Well,  if  that's  the  mine,"  says  one  of 
them,  "it  must  have  missed  us." 

A  soldier  enters  from  without.  "Did  you 
see  the  mine?"  they  ask  him. 

"Mine?  Have  you  gone  nutty?  That 
was  nothing  but  a  little  blast,  fifty  yards 
from  here.  There  wasn't  anything  to  see 
above  the  ground." 


XXIV 

THE  CANNONADE 

FOR  you  who  listen  to  it  from  afar — 
from  two  hundred  miles,  say  the 
scientists — the  cannonade  is  noise. 
Oh,  I  know  it  is  agony  for  you,  especially 
when  you  have  dear  ones  at  the  front;  you 
shudder  at  the  thought  that  these  brutal 
shells  may  be  crushing  and  rending  those 
whom  you  love.  But,  however  vivid  your 
imagination  may  be,  I  do  not  think  that  you 
can  find  in  the  uproar  of  the  cannon  such 
meaning  as  it  has  for  Bourru. 

For  our  soldier  this  cannonade  has  a  sense, 
a  purpose.  The  direction  of  the  shot,  its 
speed,  its  acceleration,  its  retardation,  its 
sudden  bursts  of  violence — all  these  things 

242 


THE  CANNONADE 


24'3 


are  an  indication  of  the  enemy's  thought, 
just  as  a  doctor  finds  the  patient's  pulse  full 
of  meaning  as  to  the  state  of  his  heart. 

On  certain  afternoons  the  cannonade 
seems  hesitant,  hypocritical.  It  comes  from 
the  direction  of  ^lontfaucon. 

*'Good!"  says  Bourru.  "I'll  take  the  shel- 
ters  near  the  kitchens." 

But — Boom!  The  shells  now  begin  to 
come  from  Hill  263,  on  the  west.  What 
does  this  mean?  The  bombardment  con- 
tinues slowly,  very  slowly, — (^ly  a  shell 
every  five  minutes,  though  they  come  from 
every  point  of  the  compass.  There  is  an 
hour's  cessation,  and  then  they  begin  again. 
When  they  come  stealthily  like  this,  from  all 
sides,  without  apparent  fixed  plan,  you  want 
to  look  out, — especially  if  there  is  a  Boche 
aviator  in  the  air.  These  are  trial  shots,  and 
the  Boche  guns  are  likely  to  turn  loose  a 
sudden  and  terrible  bombardment  to-night. 

At  times  the  cannonade  is  far  away,  and 
sounds  like  the  droning  of  an  old  woman 


244  BOURRU 

putting  a  baby  to  sleep.  The  voice  of  the 
guns  hums  the  time,  "one,  two,  three,  one, 
two,  three";  and  there  is  nothing  to  fear  at 
these  moments. 

"It's  just  to  let  us  know  that  the  war  is 
not  over  yet,"  declares  Bourru. 

At  other  times  the  voice  has  a  more  dis- 
quieting rhythm.  It  is  not  merely  the  ca- 
dence of  the  batteries  of  77's,  for  the  "big 
black  beasts"  are  interrupting  the  time  with 
their  false  notes,  like  the  hiccoughs  of  a 
drunkard  at  a  concert. 

"Hah!"  says  Bourru.  "Sounds  as  if 
they're  drunk,  the  Boches!" 

There  are  also  moments  when  the  cannon- 
ade is  very  slow — too  slow,  for  it  is  as  if 
the  enemy  gunners  were  doing  it  on  purpose 
to  reassure  us  and  put  us  off  our  guard. 
They  seem  to  say,  "You  see,  we're  not  all 
bad  fellows,  so  go  ahead  and  rest  easy." 

"Look  out,"  is  Bourru's  advice.  "They'll 
be  spitting  fire  pretty  soon." 

Sometimes  the  cannonade  starts  up  like  a 


THE  CANNONADE  245 

flash  of  anger  in  a  hot-tempered  man.  The 
shells  fall  thick  and  fast  and  you  can  guess 
that  the  gunners  are  "hitting  it  up."  Surely 
a  convoy  or  a  column  of  troops  must  have  let 
themselves  be  seen  in  some  clearing  of  the 
woods,  or  maybe  the  Bodies  have  seen  bayo- 
nets gleaming  from  a  trench,  and  so  have  got 
scared  and  started  sending  their  big  shells 
in  a  fury,  like  a  coward  firing  his  revolver 
into  the  trunk  of  a  tree  that  grins  from  a 
dark  shadow. 

Oh,  these  big  Jack  Johnsons,  what  beasts 
they  are!  While  you  are  walking  along  in 
a  forest  on  a  dreamy  spring  day  they  will 
suddenly  burst  a  little  way  behind  you,  like 
some  boor  sitting  down  heavily  and  breaking 
through  a  fragile  I^ouis  XVI  easy  chair. 
Bourru  prefers  to  hear  the  75 's — they  fire 
away  at  the  Boche  with  a  sound  like  a  slap 
from  a  vigorous  hand. 

Our  own  big  guns  also  sing  a  pleasant 
song.  When  one  of  their  shells  passes  over 
the  hill  Bourru  never  fails  to  say: 


246  BOURRU 

"There's  the  Vauquois  autobus  going  for 
a  visit  to  the  Boches." 

But  when  one  is  in  the  second  line,  in  the 
woods,  and  near  the  guns,  it  is  much  too 
deafening  to  listen  to  the  big  fellows  firing. 
The  huts  tremble,  the  window-panes  of  oiled- 
paper  split,  and  even  in  your  hole  in  the 
ground  you  feel  the  concussion  to  the  pit  of 
your  stomach. 

And  then  you  must  never  forget  that  the 
Boches  are  replying.  You  can  hear  the  shot 
from  the  direction  of  Montfaucon,  then  the 
whistling,  still  far  away — and  if  you  hap- 
pen to  be  chatting  in  a  group  of  soldiers  at 
the  foot  of  a  tree  when  you  hear  the  shell 
coming,  the  sporty  thing  is  not  to  interrupt 
the  conversation.  Vree-e-e-e!  whistles  the 
shell.  And  you  go  on  talking  indifferently 
of  this  or  that,  although  every  man  in  the 
group  has  his  mind  on  the  trajectory  of 
the  shell  that  is  on  its  way.  The  proof  of 
this  is  that  if  the  shell  buries  itself  in  the 
ground  without  exploding,  some  hundreds 


THE  CANNONADE  247 

of  yards  away,  everyone  will  cry  out  in 
chorus : 

"Loupe!" 

Which  word,  for  Bourru,  means  "It's  all 
right,  the  shell  was  no  good." 


XXV 

A  RELIEF  AT  NIGHT 

DURING  my  last  furlough  I  heard 
it  is  said  that  somewhere  on  the 
front  there  are  poilus  who  can't  be 
persuaded  to  leave  their  trenches.  If  forced 
to  go  away  on  a  furlough,  they  entreat  their 
companions : 

"Above  all,  you  hear — ^no  attack  while  I 
am  gone !" 

For  these  astonishing  poilus  a  relief  from 
duty  is  enough  to  break  their  hearts. 
Heavens  I  to  stay  a  fortnight  in  the  rear,  far 
from  the  shells,  bullets,  mud,  and  lice?  How 
shall  we  console  the  fellows? 

Oh,  why  have  I  not  met  one  of  those  good 
heroes?    How  delighted  I  should  have  been 

248 


Bto 


A  RELIEF  AT  NIGHT  249 

to  follow  his  footsteps  and  listen  to  his 
epochal  utterances  I  I  should  have  set  them 
down  hot  on  the  paper  and  you  would  have 
thrilled  with  admiration  at  them. 

But  as  for  my  poor  Bourru,  upon  whom 
I  stumhle  every  time  I  look  for  a  soldier  to 
exhibit  to  you,  he  is  too  easily  pleased  with 
the  satisfactions  of  the  flesh.  So  it  is  that, 
for  forty-eight  hours,  he  has  been  conscious 
of  a  certain  pleasure  at  the  thought  that  his 
relief  is  near.  For  two  weeks  he  has  been 
living  in  a  tunnel,  a  sort  of  cave  ten  yards 
under  ground,  out  of  which  he  came  only 
for  the  purpose  of  taking  his  turn  at  senti- 
nel duty.  You  cannot  imagine  how  long  the 
time  seems  when  you  are  living  in  this  damp 
cavern  shaken  by  mine-explosions.  That  is 
why  the  men  are  anxiously  waiting  for  the 
moment  of  relief.  For  some  days  already 
the  rumors  have  been  circulating. 

"It's  coming  to-morrow,"  the  assistant 
post-master  has  said. 

"No,  no,"  declares  another;  "it's  for  to- 


250  BOURRU 

night — I  heard  so  from  the  officers'  cook." 
Toward  midday,  in  fact,  the  indications 
become  clearer.  The  orderhes  of  the  officers 
may  be  seen  coming  out  of  the  tunnel,  car- 
rying the  light  baggage  of  their  "bosses"  to 
the  kitchens,  two  miles  in  the  rear. 

But  still  no  definite  order  has  come. 
Hitherto  notice  has  been  given  a  day  in  ad- 
vance, but  the  talkative  fellows  could  not 
keep  from  expressing  their  joy  out  loud, 
even  in  the  front  line,  ten  yards  from  the 
Boches,  and  the  result  was  that  the  relief 
was  "celebrated"  by  the  210's.  Now  the  men 
are  not  notified  until  the  last  minute.  But 
however  the  officers  may  guard  the  secret, 
the  moment  of  the  relief  is  guessed,  felt, — 
smelt  out,  as  it  were.  Something  in  the  air 
is  whispering  it  to  everyone. 

At  seven  in  the  evening  the  officer  of  the 
relieving  regiment  comes  to  dine  with  the  of- 
ficers of  the  regiment  to  be  relieved.  There 
is  no  more  doubt  now — the  relief  will  come 
at  ten  o'clock,  as  it  did  last  time. 


A  RELIEF  AT  NIGHT  251 

Every  soldier  gets  his  pack  ready;  and  I 
am  willing  to  engage  that  no  poet  leaving 
on  the  most  wonderful  of  voyages  has  ever 
had  such  joy  in  strapping  his  trunks  as 
Bourru  finds  in  making  up  his  pack.  In 
the  front  trench  the  sergeants  are  giving  or- 
ders in  low  tones: 

*'Come  on,  clean  up  the  trench.  Pick  up 
all  the  empty  cartridges,  and  put  the  gren- 
ades in  place." 

Tlie  men  take  stock  of  the  matiriel — the 
pulverizer,  the  braziers,  the  wadding  for  gas- 
masks, the  fagots,  the  solution  of  hyposul- 
phate. 

"You  know  what  those  fellows  in  the  — th 
regiment  are,"  growls  Sergeant  Lachard; 
"they'll  always  say  we  left  'em  a  rotten 
trench." 

At  eight  o'clock  comes  the  little  session  of 
trench-mortars  traditional  at  the  moment 
when  night  arrives. 

Half  past  ten  I  Through  one  of  the  en- 
trances to  the  tunnel  stream  the  fellows  of 


262  BOURRU 

the  relieving  regiment.  Bourru  and  his 
comrades  must  leave  by  the  other  entrance. 
Oh,  you  must  not  expect  any  salutes  or  for- 
malities between  those  arriving  and  those 
departing.  It  is  hard  for  them  to  see  each 
other,  even,  in  the  damp  passage-way,  il- 
luminated only  by  a  few  dim  candles. 

"Be  sure  you  carry  on,  as  we  did,"  say 
those  departing. 

"Is  the  scrap  pretty  hot  just  now?"  ask 
the  new  arrivals. 

The  newcomers  who  are  to  relieve  the  sen- 
tinels have  gone  straight  to  the  firing  trench ; 
and  here  are  the  men  relieved  coming  down 
outside  the  tunnel,  through  the  trenches  that 
wind  down  the  hill.  Whew  I  It's  good,  this 
breath  of  fresh  air.  But  from  this  moment 
on,  one  obsession  grips  every  man  in  the  regi- 
ment— above  all  things,  keep  your  mouth 
shut,  tread  softly,  and  be  careful  not  to 
strike  your  platter  against  the  stones  in  the 
trench  wall.  And  your  bayonet?  Wliat, 
you  idiot,  haven't  you  got  it  in  the  sheath? 


A  RELIEF  AT  NIGHT  253 

Great  heavens,  haven't  you  stuffed  the 
sheath  with  cotton?  Lord,  have  mercy! 
Now  listen,  I  m  telling  you  something — 
don't  you  make  any  noise,  not  a  sound! 
And  don't  you  think  because  I'm  whisper- 
ing that  these  orders  are  any  laughing  mat- 
ter! 

Through  the  long  connecting-trenches, 
the  men  go  down  toward  the  foot  of  the  hill, 
with  backs  bent  low,  in  silence.  It  makes 
you  think  of  cats  coming  down  from  a  roof 
on  a  dark  night. 

Splash !  There  goes  Roger  slipping  in  the 
trench.  He  failed  to  see  a  hole  left  by  a 
shell  an  hour  ago.  You  do  not  have  to  wait 
long  for  the  result.  A\nisih — shish!  It  is 
as  if  a  great  stone  were  flying  through  the 
air  in  rapid  jerks.  That  is  a  74  shell  com- 
ing from  a  German  pneumatic  cannon. 
Bah!  we  have  seen  plenty  of  those.  The 
procession  toward  the  foot  of  the  hill  con- 
tinues. But  there,  there!  I  knew  it  would 
happen — a  reserve  company  of  the  relief 


254  BOURRU 

coming  up  has  got  into  the  trench  before 
their  time  and  the  heads  of  the  two  columns 
have  just  run  into  each  other.  It's  always 
the  same  thing!  The  devil  take  those  fel- 
lows! 

The  two  companies  have  stopped  still. 
The  men  in  the  lead  of  each  column  stand 
their  ground  firmly,  talking  low.  Ah,  the 
imprecations  that  each  man  chokes  down 
during  this  forced  halt!  What  a  relief  it 
would  be  to  hurl  a  few  hot  insults  in  the  face 
of  the  men  who  make  you  stand  here  where 
at  any  instant  the  bombs  may  begin  falling! 
But  after  all,  there  is  a  rule ;  those  who  were 
coming  up  are  obliged  to  go  back.  Whew! 
Here  we  are  at  the  bottom  of  the  hill,  out- 
side the  zone  of  hand  projectiles,  though  in 
easy  reach  of  the  others.  It  still  is  no  place 
for  making  your  retreat  at  your  ease,  I  as- 
sure you.  So  everybody  chafes  with  impa- 
tience when  Sergeant  Lachard  calls  the  roll 
of  the  platoon.  Those  who  are  present  al- 
ways find  that  the  platoon  is  all  there,  and 


A  RELIEF  AT  NIGHT  255 

may  as  well  go  on  without  delay.  "Yes, 
yes,  everybody's  here,  sergeant;  let's  go  onl'* 
In  Indian  file  the  men  cross  a  terrain  torn 
up  by  shells,  and  then  skirt  the  forest  in  or- 
der to  take  advantage  of  the  shade  of  the 
trees. 

Farther  on,  the  platoons  come  together, 
the  companies  take  formation,  and  the  col- 
umn begins  its  march  again.  It  mounts  a 
hill. 

Once  they  are  over  the  crest  of  this  hill, 
the  danger  of  being  picked  up  by  the  enemy 
artillery  is  much  smaller.  The  column 
marches  along  over  a  monotonous  road, 
through  the  empty  night.  The  intense  ex- 
citement is  over;  and  weariness  falls  upon 
our  men's  shoulders  like  a  leaden  garment; 
but  they  go  on,  half  asleep,  dragging  their 
heavy  legs  toward  the  cantonment  in  the 
rear,  in  that  land  of  dreams  where  people  live 
in  real  houses  and  where  one  can  sleep  on 
real  straw. 


XXVI 

AFTER  TWO  WEEKS  IN  THE 
TRENCHES 

ON  the  way  back  from  the  front  lines 
where  he  had  just  spent  two  weeks 
Bourru  was  very  tired  indeed,  and 
his  weary,  jolting  gait  bore  witness  to  the 
truth  of  what  he  kept  grumbling  to  him- 
self: 

"It  beats  all  how  two  weeks  in  those 
trenches  makes  jelly  of  a  fellow's  legs." 
Nevertheless,  when  the  troop  passed  in 

front  of  the  railway  station  at  A ,  our 

soldier  was  startled  into  lifting  his  head. 
Could  it  be  possible?  Could  these  be  real 
stone  houses,  rails,  coaches?  My,  but  they 
were  fine  things!    He  had  completely  for- 

256 


AFTER  TWO  WEEKS  257 


gotten  that  the  world  held  railway  stations, 
those  symbols  of  civilization. 

For  I  must  tell  you — all  you  world-weary 
seekers  for  famous  sights,  you  grumbling 
tourists  who  always  find  the  stations  ugly 
and  commonplace, — I  must  needs  tell  you 
that  unless  you  have  lived  for  months  in  the 
wilds,  you  can  never  know  the  infinite  poetry 
that  dwells  in  an  oblong  building  with  rails 
and  coaches  around  it.  On  the  wall  are  in- 
scribed three  very  simple  words,  but  no  mas- 
ter of  style  will  ever  find  a  phrase  more  elo- 
quent in  its  conciseness — ''Direction  de 
Paris"  The  mind  takes  flight  along  the 
rails  and  in  the  golden  haze  of  its  dream  one 
has  visions  of  Paris,  Dijon,  Lyons,  Bligny 
— Bourru's  village — visions,  indeed,  of  all 
France. 

"Come  on  there — shake  a  leg!''  shout  the 
sergeants,  hustling  their  men  forward. 

"If  they  were  let  alone,"  cries  the  adju- 
tant, "they'd  stay  there  till  to-morrow  morn- 
ing!" 


258  BOURRU 

More  than  anybody  else  it  is  Lafut,  nick- 
named Father  "Red-Ink,"  who  delays  the 
column;  hypnotized  by  the  tank-cars  that 
daily  bring  the  wine  for  the  division,  he 
stands  silent  and  immovable,  lost  in  admira- 
tion. His  lips  exhibit  an  instinctive  suck- 
ing movement,  and  one  can  see  that  he  would 
like  to  give  the  immense  receptacles  passion- 
ate embraces.  .  .  . 

By  this  time  the  dawn  is  coming  on.  Hav- 
ing passed  through  A ,  we  see  the  vil- 
lage that  is  our  destination  dreamily  hidden 
away  in  the  verdure  and  the  mists  of  the 
morning.  One  feels  that  he  is  marching 
toward  a  nest  rich  in  promises  of  warm  com- 
fort. Come  on,  then,  heads  up — one  more 
hitch  to  keep  your  pack  on  your  shoulders 
— and  here  we  are!  Piping  hot  coffee  is 
ready  for  the  new  arrivals. 

"Anyhow,"  murmurs  Bourru,  "these  stay- 
at-homes  are  good  for  something." 

But  nobody  has  time  for  expressing  his 
thanks,  for  there  is  just  one  thing  that  is 


AFTER  TWO  WEEKS  259 

all-important — to  get  to  sleep.  Ah,  the  joy 
of  lying  clown,  stretching  out  your  limbs, 
and  yielding  to  overwhelming  sleep — what 
voluptuous  pleasure  for  men  who  for  two 
weeks  have  done  nothing  but  doze  in  a  nar- 
row tunnel,  sitting  up !  There  is  a  universal 
rush  for  the  barns. 

Everybody  goes  to  sleep.  But  you  are 
well  aware,  you  who  are  skilled  in  psychol- 
ogjy  that  even  when  asleep  a  man  may  be 
happy  or  miserable;  even  in  the  deepest 
sleep  there  are  ideas  that  make  themselves 
felt  in  the  depths  of  consciousness.  At  this 
hour  there  is  this  one  idea  in  the  minds  of 
my  sleeping  Rourrus:  "^Vhew!  No  trench- 
bombs  here,  no  mines,  no  torpedoes.  .  .  ." 
It  is  a  very  simple  idea,  but  if  you  have  ever 
enjoyed  it  in  a  flash  of  slumbrous  thought 
when  you  were  rolling  over  on  the  straw  of 
a  barn  in  an  effort  to  find  a  more  comfort- 
able position,  you  know  one  of  the  great 
pleasures  of  life. 

At  ten  in  the  morning  Bourru  wakes  up 


260  BOURRU 

for  good  and  all,  in  expansive  comfort.  It 
is  a  fine  day;  the  sunshine  sparkles  every- 
where, and  the  future  seems  infinitely  long. 
Ten  days  of  rest  in  front  of  you — before 
that  is  gone,  the  war  will  be  over  I  There  is 
one  sole  trouble — ^you  have  to  go  and  drill. 
A  sensation  comes  to  bring  Bourru  back  to 
the  facts  of  life — oh,  it  is  nothing  profoundly 
psychological,  be  assured,  it  is  merely  a 
cootie,  a  "toto''  which  is  biting  him  under 
the  arm.  "I  must  go  and  wash  up,"  thinks 
the  soldier. 

At  the  river  there  is  a  multitude;  along 
the  banks  there  is  nothing  to  be  seen  but 
naked  legs  and  busts.  The  caresses  of  the 
water  all  over  your  body — ah,  how  luxur- 
ious! So  you  soap  yourself,  wet  yourself, 
and  go  into  contortions  to  wash  yourself  all 
over.  Along  the  river-banks  you  seem  to  see 
an  exhibition  of  athletes. 

"Lachard,  old  boy,"  says  Bourru,  "you're 
not  getting  fat  on  this  war;  you're  showing 
your  ribs,  you  know.  .  .  ." 


AFTER  TWO  WEEKS  261 

"Don't  you  worry,  Bourru,  old  boy;  the 
main  tiling  is  to  sell  your  fat  for  all  you  can 
get  from  the  Boches  for  it." 

"Any  notion  how  you're  going  to  get 
lunch?"  cries  out  Fabri. 

"I've  managed  that,  all  right,"  declares 
Delporte.  "There  wasn't  a  thing  left  at  the 
grocery,  but  I  ran  into  L'Energie,  the  colo- 
nel's orderly.  lie  was  going  along  with  four 
cans  of  lobster,  and  I  hooked  one." 

"And  I  guess  you  think  I  pass  my  time 
snoring,"  says  Aubouin.  "Look  here  and 
I'll  show  you  a  fine  dandelion  salad  that  I 
went  and  gathered  you  this  morning." 

And  a  little  later  my  four  poilus  are  en- 
sconced in  their  magnificent  dining  quarters. 
Just  imagine  a  shaft  of  wall,  left  standing 
from  a  burned  house.  You  need  only  know 
how  to  make  the  most  of  it.  Is  the  wind 
blowing  from  the  north?  You  install  your- 
self on  the  south  side,  in  the  sun.  Is  it  too 
warm?  You  dine  on  the  northern  side,  in 
the  shade,  upon  great  hewn  stones  that  have 


262  BOURRU 

tumbled  into  a  pile  for  the  express  purpose, 
it  would  seem,  of  forming  a  table  for  you. 
An  ancient  agricultural  machine  serves  for 
a  coat-tree.  The  incomparable  advantage 
of  this  dining-hall  is  that  it  has  a  magnifi- 
cent view — ^no  walls  to  intervene,  nothing 
but  the  landscape  spread  before  your  eyes, 
and  the  poplars  that  line  the  river  lead  away 
in  sinuous  lines  into  blue  distances,  infinitely 
charming  to  the  eye.  Truly  it  is  comfort- 
able to  feel  that  you  are  defender  of  such  a 
land — especially  when  you  are  sipping  "red 
ink"  at  twenty- two  sous  a  bottle. 

In  the  afternoon  you  give  yourself  up  to 
your  immense  satisfaction.  Seated  at  the 
door  of  your  barn,  you  luxuriate  in  rest.  In 
the  village  street  the  auto-trucks  are  cease- 
lessly passing;  the  locomotive  of  track  60, 
a  rickety  old  thing,  is  spitting  out  its  silly 
smoke  and  starting  off  with  a  clangor  of 
metal;  the  motors  are  rumbling,  the  drivers 
are  yelling,  the  soldiers  are  shouting  to  one 
another,  the  blacksmiths  are  making  their 


AFTER  TWO  WEEKS  263 

anvils  ring:  Your  mouth  is  full  of  dust, 
your  nostrils  of  smoke,  and  your  ears  of  up- 
roar. But  all  that  is  nothing;  Bourru  con- 
tinues to  "take  the  air"  in  the  shade  of  his 
barn,  tranquil,  beatific. 

And  as  I  look  at  him  I  think  of  that 
philosophy  that  teaches  that  the  universe 
has  no  external  existence,  but  that  we  create 
it  with  our  minds.  A  soldier  just  out  of  the 
trenches  finds  that  the  tumult  of  this  street 
is  a  delightful  silence. 

After  this  beatitude  another  luxury 
awaits  you — to  go  for  a  stroll  without  hav- 
ing to  keep  your  eyes  on  the  search  for 
treacherous  grenades.  It  is  a  wonderful 
new  existence  for  you;  you  have  learned 
again  the  feeling  of  the  elementary  sensa- 
tions of  life.  And  to  think  that  there  are 
people  that  "get  sick"  of  it!  Why  aren't 
they  in  the  company  of  my  Bourrus,  on 
the  bridge  over  the  Aire,  watching  the 
horses  being  led  to  water,  and  empty- 
mindedly  spitting  into  the  stream?    That's 


264  BOURRU 

what  happiness  is.  And  you  say  to  your- 
self: 

"There  goes  that  chump  Crochard,  the 
captain's  orderly,  on  his  nag;  watch  him 
make  a  mess  of  himself  in  the  water." 

And  while  following  the  movements  of 
the  restive  horse  you  amuse  yourself  at  the 
notion  that  the  trooper  might  take  a  header, 
and  you  laugh  at  it  in  advance.  Then,  when 
you  have  had  enough  of  looking  at  the  river, 
you  go  "down  town"  to  buy  tobacco.  You 
run  into  fellows  from  the  other  companies 
and  chat  with  them  as  long  as  you  like.  Men 
with  furloughs  are  taking  their  departure; 
at  the  top  of  your  voice  you  call  after  them, 
"Have  a  good  time  I"  And  then  you  are 
astounded  at  the  notion  of  yelling  all  you 
want  without  giving  yourself  away  to  the 
enemy. 

But  I  must  pause,  or  everybody  will  be 
running  to  strap  his  trunk  and  come  to  join 
us — and  we  are  already  so  crowded! 


XXVII 
HONOR  TO  THOSE  WHO  FALL 

IS  it  necessary  to  tell  you  that  I  am  fol- 
lowing neither  rule  nor  method  in 
writing  this  book?  That  is  apparent 
enough,  I  suppose.  What  help  for  it?  Life 
is  so  strenuous  here  that  a  brain  a  little  ex- 
cited receives  from  it  impressions,  pictures, 
emotions,  and  ideas  in  the  same  abundance 
as  a  soldier  in  the  first  line  receives  shells 
on  the  day  of  an  attack. 

I  am  sending  it  all  to  you  in  a  jumble, 
along  with  the  old  cartridges,  the  aluminum 
rings,  and  the  blank  bullets  that  the  poilus 
ship  you.  I  understand  that  you  arrange 
all  this  bric-a-brac  on  your  mantelpieces 
with  great  care  and  devotion.    So  I  am  send- 

265 


266  BOURRU 

ing  a  few  more  fragmentary  sketches  of 

Bourru. 

¥it  *  m  *  * 

When  possible,  the  bodies  of  officers,  and 
sometimes  of  privates,  who  have  fallen,  are 
carried  back  to  the  rest  cantonments  in  the 
rear  and  interred  in  the  village  cemeteries 
or  nearby  under  some  row  of  plum-trees. 

To-day,  All  Saints'  Day,  the  clouds  are 
so  lowering  and  the  landscape  so  somber  that 
an  undefined  sadness  has  come  over  the  sol- 
diers all  through  the  rest-camp.  You  can 
see  them  walking  pensively  about,  avoiding 
futile  chatter. 

At  one  end  of  the  village,  in  a  meadow, 
nine  wooden  crosses  stand  in  a  row;  it  is  the 
cemetery  of  officers  recently  fallen.  This 
morning  men  were  there  putting  flowers 
on  the  graves,  but  now  the  place  is  de- 
serted. A  lone  magpie  nearby  is  emitting 
its  cry,  irritating  because  so  inexpressive. 
I  am  seated  under  a  bush  lost  in  medi- 
tation. 


HONOR  TO  THOSE  WHO  FALL  267 

Suddenly  a  soldier  appears  on  the  scene. 
At  a  glance  he  assures  himself  that  he  is 
quite  alone;  he  has  not  noticed  me. 

Then  with  a  firm  step  he  approaches  the 
grave  at  the  right,  comes  to  attention  with 
head  held  high,  and  stands  motionless  for  a 
few  instants,  at  military  salute. 

Turning  then  two  paces  to  the  left  he 
takes  position  hefore  the  second  tomb,  re- 
peating his  gesture;  and  thus  he  continues 
to  the  end  of  the  line,  where  he  makes  an 
"about-turn,"  in  perfect  form,  and  departs. 
Every  movement  had  been  executed  cor- 
rectly, smartly,  as  when  a  soldier  is  intent 
on  pleasing  his  officer. 

As  the  soldier  goes  on  his  way,  I  stretch 

my  neck  to  see  who  he  is.    It  is  Bourru. 

^  4(  «  «  « 

A  210  shell  has  just  fallen  on  a  trench 
where  everything  had  been  quiet.  Some  of 
the  soldiers  who  have  been  knocked  down  by 
the  ''breath"  of  it  are  getting  up  dumb- 
founded, feeling  themselves,  and  finding  to 


268  BOURRU 

their  astonishment  that  their  members  are 
still  in  place. 

Others  are  groaning  from  wounds. 
Among  them  all  the  shock  has  staggered  and 
confused  their  minds;  there  remain  in  their 
consciousness  only  the  most  deeply  rooted 
ideas,  such  as  everyone  carries  within  him 
like  those  habits  of  reaction  in  which  the 
ancient  instincts  of  the  race  are  expressed. 

From  the  mouth  of  a  wounded  man  who  is 
being  carried  off  comes  this  unexpected  re- 
quest, touching  because  it  reveals  a  deep-felt 
need: 

"I*m  done  for — but  bury  me  decently,  if 
you  can." 

He  dies  before  reaching  the  first-aid  sta- 
tion. 

During  the  night  Bourru  and  Cormier 
wrap  the  body  in  a  tent-cloth.  Each  of  the 
two  soldiers  takes  one  end  of  the  body  and, 
climbing  down  the  connecting  trench  and 
scaling  the  slopes  of  INIamelon  Blanc,  they 
carry  it  two  miles  to  the  rear,  to  the  Barri- 


HONOR  TO  THOSE  WHO  FALL     269 

cade.  Here  there  is  a  proper  cemetery — 
the  stretcher-bearers  dig  a  grave  for  each 
body.    That  is  a  great  privilege. 


It  is  the  burial  of  an  officer.  The  priest 
has  just  finished  the  prayers,  and  the  sol- 
diers, of  whom  Bourru  is  one,  are  standing 
guard  at  the  grave. 

General  Valdant  comes  forward.  For  a 
long  time  he  stands  silent,  leaning  over  the 
coffin;  it  is  as  if  his  thought  could  not  de- 
tach itself  from  tlie  image  of  death,  but  is 
awaiting  inspiration. 

When  he  speaks  it  is  a  strange  discourse, 
restrained  and  powerful  at  once.  Nothing 
is  heard  but  names  and  dates,  separated  by 
long  silences  during  which  meditation  broods 
deep. 

''Spettel  .  .  .  February  17,  1015,  Fan- 
quois.  .  .  .  The  battle.  .  .  .  Februari/  2S, 
1915,  Auzeville.  ...  The  reward .  .  .  . 
May  29,  1916,  Vanquois,  ...  The  sacri- 
fice, .  .  .  To-day  J  Auzeville.  .  ,  ,  Eternal 
rest/' 


270  BOURRU 

You  who  read  the  words  may  possibly 
find  them  enigmatical.  But  try  to  see  the 
scene  with  a  poet's  eye — giving  play  to  your 
imagination.  .  .  . 

In  the  middle  of  the  group  stands  the  gen- 
eral, small  in  stature,  but  firmly  erect, 
upon  the  soil  of  the  Argonne  which  he  has 
been  defending  for  many  months.  At  this 
moment  a  pensive  melancholy  modifies  the 
energy  of  his  expression.  Around  him  are 
soldiers,  nothing  but  soldiers  of  Vauquois. 
What  need  to  explain  to  them  the  visions  in 
his  soul?  There  is  no  necessity  to  aid  them 
to  fill  their  minds  with  touching  images 
when  they  hear  the  words. 

"February  17,  Vauquois,  .  .  .  The  hat- 
tie"  In  a  flash  they  can  see  the  noble  sol- 
diers of  the  year  before,  those  who  climbed 
to  storm  the  hill.  Spettel  is  in  the  lead,  with 
his  friends.  Intoxicated  with  martial  ex- 
citement, they  rush  into  the  village  on  which 
the  shells  are  falling,  and  before  them  the 
Germans  fly  in  terror. 


HONOR  TO  THOSE  WHO  FALL  271 

"February  23,  Auzeville,  .  .  .  The  re- 
ward" Five  days  after  the  attack,  on  the 
ridge  between  the  Grange-Lecomte  and 
Auzeville,  facing  the  tragic  hill  which  stands 
out  in  the  distance,  the  regiments  are  lined 
up  for  review.  The  heroes  are  in  front  of 
the  ranks,  and  Spettel  is  among  them.  They 
receive  their  decorations,  and  the  bugles  in 
long  blasts  tell  their  glory  to  all  the  echoes 
of  the  Argonne. 

"Maij  20,  1916,  Vauquois.  .  .  .  The  sac- 
rifice" Spettel  is  repeating  up  to  the  last 
minute:  "It's  all  right.  .  .  .  It's  all  for 
France." 

To-day,  Auzeville.  .  .  .  Eternal  rest" 

)mpanions  in  arms  stand  around  a  coflin 
which  the  soil  of  France  is  receiving  with 
the  love  of  a  mother  for  her  cherished  son, 
while  prayers  are  rising  to  heaven,  and  rough 
men  brush  away  a  tear  at  the  thought  of  the 
;at  future  that  will  roll  its  centuries  over 

iis  sacred  land. 

It  is  the  tragic  epitome  of  a  hero's  life. 


272  BOURRU 

In  truth,  the  general  at  one  leap  reaches  the 
heights  of  eloquence  when,  disdaining  all 
rhetoric,  seeming,  indeed,  to  speak  to  him- 
self, he  slowly  pronounces  those  dates  and 
names,  so  weighted  with  meaning:  ''Feb- 
ruary 17,  Vauquois,  the  battle,  .  .  .  Feb- 
ruary 23,  Auzeville,  the  reward,  ,  .  ." 

Another  day,  at  the  burial  of  an  officer,  a 
tall,  thin  captain  is  speaking;  there  is  a  sort 
of  mystic  ardor  in  the  tones  of  his  voice. 

Bourru  remembers  his  words. 

*'And  I  would  say  to  you  in  truth,  my 
friends,  that  we  must  not  think  that  the  sad 
honors  which  we  render  this  day  to  an  offi- 
cer indicate  a  willingness  to  raise  a  barrier, 
even  after  death,  between  officers  and  men. 
All  the  men  who  give  their  lives  for  their 
country  belong  to  the  same  aristocracy, 
whatever  may  be  their  rank. 

"In  this  ceremony  of  interment  we  must 
see  a  symbol.  For  it  is  more  than  an  honor 
rendered  to  a  leader;  it  epitomizes  all  the 


HONOR  TO  THOSE  WHO  FALL     273 

pious  sentiments  that  dwell  in  our  hearts  for 
the  heroes  whose  bodies  must  remain  near 
the  trenches.  Time  does  not  permit  us  to 
render  to  these  humble  brothers  in  arms  their 
meed  of  individual  glory.  While  waiting 
for  the  victorious  trumpet  blasts  over  their 
graves,  they  send  representatives  to  the  vil- 
lage in  the  rear  in  order  that  the  ancient  rites 
of  military  funeral  may  be  observed  in  their 
name.  These  representatives  are  the  very 
men  who,  on  the  field  of  battle,  have  showed 
them  the  patli  to  sacrifice. 

"And  that  is  why,  in  presenting  arms  to- 
day before  this  coffin,  I  invite  you  at  the 
same  moment  to  turn  toward  the  Hill,  and, 
with  a  full  heart,  to  indulge  an  affectionate 
memory  of  our  brothers  in  arms  who  remain 
upon  it  in  repose,  under  the  ruins  of  the  vil- 
lage of  Vauquois." 


XXVIII 
UNDER  BOMBARDMENT 

YOU  are  sure  you  really  want  me  to 
show  you  the  scenes  of  war  just  as 
they  are?  You  have  the  right,  you 
claim,  to  look  on  from  afar,  without  colored 
glasses,  at  the  brute  facts  of  the  war  which 
our  poilus  must  meet  face  to  face.  In  this 
way  your  admiration  will  rise  to  the  height 
of  the  real  merits  of  our  soldiers. 

Bourru  is  happy  enough  to  hear  you  say 
this.  For  there  are  still  weighing  on  his 
heart  a  few  innocent  words  which  a  civilian, 
and  a  very  good  friend  of  his,  too,  has  just 
written  to  him.  "Well,  well!  So  there  are 
only  little  bombardments  going  on  in  your 
sector?    No  bayonet  charges?    So  much  the 

274 


UNDER  BO:\IBARDMENT  275 

better!  I'm  glad  to  know  things  are  so  quiet 
with  you."  And  Bourru  in  his  revery  calls 
to  mind  one  of  those  ''little  hombardments." 

It  is  a  dark  night.  The  company  is  on  the 
march  toward  a  point  on  the  sector  where, 
it  seems,  the  Boches  are  expected  to  attack. 
Of  a  sudden  the  company  comes  out  of  the 
wood,  and  before  it  lies  a  dark  plain  in  tlie 
middle  of  which  a  wall  of  fire  seems  to  rise. 
It  is  the  barrage  laid  down  by  the  enemy 
guns. 

"Our  mission  is  simple,"  say  the  officers; 
"we  must  occupy  the  trenches  on  the  other 
side  of  the  barrage,  and  hold  them  at  all 
costs." 

It  is  useless  to  wait  for  a  quiet  moment  to 
traverse  the  fatal  zone;  there  is  no  quiet  mo- 
ment. 

"As  skirmishers!  Double  quick — for- 
ward!" 

Each  man  plunges  forward  with  a  feeling 
that  he  is  going  to  smash  his  head  into  a  wall. 
Then — bursting    shells,    shaking    ground, 


276  BOURRU 

whistlings  in  an  air  dense  with  smoke,  semi- 
asphyxiation,  tumbles  into  shell-holes,  mad 
racing, — without  a  thought,  with  nothing 
but  an  instinct  that  tells  you  to  keep  racing! 
"Whew!  Here  we  are!"  Sneezing  and 
stupefaction — "Honestly,  am  I  still  whole?'* 
And  one  remembers  that  in  the  red  glare 
of  the  explosions  he  saw  the  phantoms  of 
his  comrades  falling  on  the  black  soil. 

"Column  of  twos!"  shout  the  officers. 

But  where  on  earth  are  the  trenches  ?  The 
ground  is  simply  in  a  state  of  chaos,  with 
intermittent  holes  and  hillocks.  Something 
stirs  in  one  of  the  holes  as  Bourru  stumbles 
into  it — and  proves  to  be  the  man  he  has 
come  to  relieve.  The  fellow  seems  to  be 
completely  stupefied. 

"Hello,  here!  Can't  you  see  I've  come  to 
let  you  off?    Go  ahead,  beat  it!" 

The  soldier,  whose  white  eyes  are  all  that 
can  be  seen  in  the  dark,  seems  to  hesitate  be- 
fore leaving  the  hole  that  has  been  protecting 
him  for  hours.     Finally  he  goes  off  like  a 


UNDER  BOMBARDMENT  277 

crazed  man,  though  no  shells  are  falling  just 
here  at  this  moment. 

The  day  begins  to  break.  It  is  easy  to 
see  that  we  have  a  quiet  sector  here,  for 
there  are  still  strips  of  the  meadow  that  have 
not  been  torn  up.  There  is  even  a  tangle 
of  barbed-wire  still  standing.  In  front  and 
to  the  left  rises  a  hill  from  which  artillery 
observers  are  doubtless  watching;  if  they  see 
anything  stirring,  the  gims  will  speak. 

Whiz-z!     Boom!  .  .  .  The  first  shell. 

''The  meeting  will  come  to  order!"  cries 
Lachard,  that  the  traditional  gaiety  may  be 
observed. 

More  projectiles  are  coming  now,  aimed 
at  the  line  of  holes  that  takes  the  place  of  a 
trench.  The  bombardment  is  systematic — 
it  begins  five  hundred  yards  to  the  right  of 
Bourru  and  moves  slowly  along  toward  the 
left,  dropping  six  shells  at  each  objective, 
and  covering  in  order  all  the  points  of  the 
terrain.  You  feel  as  if  a  Titanic  sledge- 
hammer were  falling  furiously  along  the 


278  BOURRU 

line.  Sparks  are  flying,  and  the  anvil  makes 
all  the  echoes  of  the  Argonne  resound. 

Flattened  in  their  shell-holes,  with  bated 
breath,  eyes  closed,  and  shoulders  hunched 
as  if  a  wall  were  threatening  to  tumble  over 
them,  the  men  listen  to  the  approaching 
storm.  It  is  coming.  .  .  .  Ten  seconds  pass 
in  anguish,  during  which  the  flesh  that  hud- 
dles under  the  soldier's  packs  is  nothing  but 
that  of  an  animal.  The  storm  is  passing 
overhead.  Uproar,  thunder,  the  vision  of  a 
train  hurling  itself  into  a  tunnel,  the  shell 
concussions  that  crush  in  the  walls  of  the 
abdomen,  send  shocks  through  the  vitals, 
take  away  breath.  .  .  .  The  storm  has  gone 
by,  but  no  one  budges  yet.  The  cells  of  the 
body  are  so  shaken  together  into  a  mere  jelly 
of  flesh  that  one  must  give  them  time  to  re- 
gain human  form.  At  last  one  has  become 
a  man  again.  Saved!  The  shells  have 
fallen  in  front  of  the  line  and  behind  it,  two 
or  three  yards  at  least. 

"The  devil!"  cries  Ringuet  in  consterna- 


UNDER  BOMBARDMENT  279 

tion,  "a  splinter  has  blown  the  mess-kit  off 
the  top  of  my  pack,  and  my  tobacco  was  in 
iti" 

And  the  men  laugh.  There's  no  fear  now, 
gracious  no!  The  storm  is  howling  at  least 
two  hundred  yards  away  now.  But  here  it 
comes  back !  The  men  are  flat  to  the  ground 
again.  This  time  a  fragment  carries  away 
the  top  of  one  man's  skull  and  there  are  his 
brains,  just  like  those  of  the  fellows  in  wax 
in  the  anatomical  museums.  Without  a 
word  the  men  await  the  next  storm. 

"Oh!  Ah!"  groans  a  man.  "I'm  wounded." 

And,  indeed,  his  face  is  masked  in  blood. 

Five,  six  times,  the  storm  rains  over  the 
line.  Cormier  feels  a  terrible  blow  in  the 
back — later  he  will  find  a  shell  fragment 
embedded  in  his  pack.  Bourru  is  struck  on 
the  head  by  chunks  of  earth  that  stagger 
him.  Lachard  is  bleeding  at  the  ear  and 
searching  for  his  spectacles  in  the  mud. 
Still  another  is  singing  in  a  tone  of  raillery, 
*'It  is  raining  kisses." 


280  BOURRU 

But  it  is  getting  cloudy,  and  what  luck! 
Maybe  it  is  going  to  rain,  and  that  will  make 
it  hard  for  the  observers  to  regulate  the  fire. 
In  fact,  an  abatement  has  already  come.  A 
wounded  man  is  pleading: 

"Take  me  away,  will  you,  boys?  I'll  give 
you  ten  francs,  twenty  francs — everything 
I've  got.  Take  me  away — ^my  parents  own 
a  farm  and  they'll  give  you  all  they've  got, 
too." 

"There  now,  old  chap,  don't  be  a  fool. 
You  know  well  enough  we'd  take  you  away 
if  we  could.  Buck  up,  now,  and  wait  till 
night — you  haven't  got  anything  but  a  splin- 
ter in  your  cheek." 

The  hours  pass.  Ringuet,  having  had 
some  tobacco  given  him,  is  smoking  with  his 
head  hidden  under  a  hood.  Cormier, 
stretched  out  on  the  ground,  suddenly  spies 
a  mouse  creeping  out  of  its  hole.  He 
amuses  himself  feeding  it. 

A  flash  shoots  into  the  sky.  It  means  a 
renewal  of  the  bombardment. 


UNDER  BOMBARDMENT  281 

"Oughl  Oh!  IVe  got  a  piece  of  shell  in 
my  belly  r 

It  is  a  queer  thing,  but  Tellier,  who  was 
saying  last  night,  "I  know  that  I  won*t  es- 
cape to-morrow,"  has  not  been  touched  yet, 
though  he  alone  has  sat  upright  under  the 
storm  of  shells.  Silent,  with  a  cigarette  be- 
tween his  lips,  he  sits  there  with  his  liaunting 
eyes  staring  doubtless  into  the  mysterious 
distances  where  the  fates  are  to  be  read.  A 
splinter  in  his  heart  delivers  him  from  his 
fatalistic  watch. 

But  the  French  artillery  is  answering  the 
Boche  in  full  force.  The  sky  seems  like  a 
vault  full  of  whistling  shells.  At  a  given 
moment  the  guns  from  both  sides  seem  to 
concentrate  their  rage  on  one  point,  half  a 
mile  away,  where  the  two  lines  come  very 
close  together.  It  is  the  "trommelfeuerl" 
The  shells  from  the  big  guns  cut  up  the 
ridges,  overwhelm  the  valleys,  tear  down 
the  trees,  and  set  flying  great  chunks  of 
earth.    The  countryside  looks  as  if  it  were 


282  BOURRU 

suffering  from  an  epileptic  seizure.  Every- 
where it  trembles  from  explosions.  Leap- 
ing, bounding,  the  earth  moves  and  quivers 
and  dances  like  the  waves  of  the  sea  in  a 
tempest.  One  looks  on,  overcome  with 
stupefaction.  Out  of  this  cataclysm  are 
coming  monstrous,  hideous  things — an  ap- 
palling hell-mouth  moves  forward  to  devour 
all  before  it.  Not  a  man  among  our  soldiers 
will  live  to  tell  the  story  if  that  whirlwind 
passes  their  way. 

But  no,  reassure  yourselves;  the  tornado 
of  fire  did  not  pass  over  the  soldiers  that  you 
have  come  to  know;  they  have  had  the  luck 
to  receive  only  the  ordinary  little  shells  of 
the  105's  and  150's.  That  is  why,  since  you 
were  ready  to  imagine  horrors,  I  can  show 
you  a  little  soldier  who  has  just  had  his  hand 
taken  off  by  a  shell- fragment.  The  poor 
fellow  imagines  he  will  be  more  comfortable 
at  the  other  end  of  the  trench  and  he  is  going 
"on  all  threes";  his  poor  handless  wrist, 
dripping  blood,  hangs  like  the  paw  of  a  cat 


UNDER  BOMBARDMENT  283 

just  crushed  under  a  carriage-wheel.  After 
half  an  hour  of  such  crawling  he  comes  to 
the  side  of  a  hole  where  many  of  the 
wounded  have  taken  refuge.  With  a  final 
effort  he  rolls  forward  upon  the  heap  of 
them. 

Perhaps  now  you  can  understand  more 
fully  how  a  soldier  may  acquire  some  little 
merit  without  hudging  from  his  place  and 
without  ever  taking  part  in  one  of  those  fine 
attacks  they  put  on  picture  postcards? 


XXIX 

BOURRU  VISITS  HEADQUAR- 
TERS 

THE    captain   had   said   to   Bourru, 
"Here,  take  this  letter  to  the  staff 
offices,  to  the  Headquarters  of  the 
general,  at  Betrame." 

All  the  way  there  our  soldier  was  excited. 
Staff  offices !  The  words  evoked  in  his  mind 
the  idea  of  science,  of  maps,  automobiles, 
officers  with  bands  on  their  sleeves,  always 
anxious  and  always  hurried,  and  also,  he  did 
not  know  quite  why,  great  suites  of  rooms 
full  of  desks  such  as  he  had  seen  at  the  sub- 
prefecture  at  home.  Inside  these  places 
dwell  terrible,  mysterious  forces  that  may 
fall  upon  a  poor  trooper  without  his  knowing 

284 


BOURRU  VISITS  HEADQUARTERS     285 

whence  they  come  or  how  they  operate.  It 
is  enough,  he  has  heard,  for  the  people  at 
Headquarters  to  write  three  lines  on  a  bit  of 
paper  in  order  to  start  twenty  thousand 
men  marching.  It  was  Cormier  who  told 
him  that,  and  Cormier,  being  a  Paris  law- 
yer, surely  ought  to  know.  It's  the  papers 
at  IIcad(iuarters,  too,  that  bring  the  refrig- 
erated meat,  the  sugar  and  coffee,  the  "red 
ink";  by  Jove,  it's  funny  that  with  a  com- 
mon piece  of  paper  a  man  can  do  so 
much  I 

So  no  foolishness  now,  eli!  If  you're  go- 
to trespass  in  offices  where  all  those 
s  are  accumulated  you  want  to  be  care- 
ful. If  you  make  a  mess  of  things,  it  may 
be  worse  for  you  than  a  Vauquois  trench  full 
of  Boches.  Bourru  approaches  very  softly. 
With  great  respect  he  goes  up  to  a  chubby 
sergeant  who  seems  to  be  stationed  as  or- 
derly. 

"Where's  the  Headquarters?"  he  in- 
quires. 


ml 


286  BOURRU 

"Down  there — under  the  shelters  at  the 
end  of  the  plank  road." 

This  plank  road  is  bordered  by  various 
shelters  within  which  men  can  be  seen. 
"Well!"  says  Bourru  to  himself,  "if  they 
haven't  got  huts,  just  like  us!"  Holes  from 
recent  shells,  in  the  midst  of  the  trees,  give 
evidence  that  the  "paper-scratchers"  must 
receive  their  share  of  shells  from  time  to 
time.  Bourru  is  glad  to  know  it — ^he  doesn't 
know  exactly  why,  but  he  is  glad  to  know 
that  this  officer-soldier  that  he  is  just  meet- 
ing might  have  a  shell  fall  on  his  head  this 
very  day,  just  as  he,  Bourru,  might;  for  he 
knows  this  soldier  well — ^he  has  often  been 
pointed  out  to  Bourru — and  it  seems  that, 
back  in  Paris,  he  is  a  great  musician.  The 
proof  of  it  is  that  he  has  the  Legion  of 
Honor.  Bourru  looks  at  him  with  curi- 
osity. 

He  knocks  at  a  door. 

"Come  in,"  says  some  one. 

Our  soldier  stops  still  on  the  threshold, 


BOUllRU  VISITS  HEADQUARTERS     287 

letter  in  hand.  The  shelter  is  full  of  officers. 
One  of  them  takes  the  letter  and  while  he  is 
reading  it  Bourru  watches  and  listens. 
What  a  chance!  He  is  in  a  staff-office — a 
solemn  moment!  He  nmst  be  on  his  best 
behavior  among  such  important  people  and 
still  he  must  see  all  he  can,  so  that  later  on 
he  can  astound  the  boys  in  the  company  with 
a  wonderful  story.  It's  queer,  but  on  the 
whole  these  officers  don't  seem  so  terrible  as 
he  thought.  There  is  a  thin,  pale  little  cap- 
tain who  is  reading  a  newspaper  in  some 
strange  print;  honestly,  it  looks  like  Cliinese. 
That  chap  must  be  awfully  brainy;  he  has 
got  papers  all  around  him,  and  with  his  pale 
face  and  his  eye-glasses  he  looks  like  the 
cure  whom  l^ourru  used  to  know  at  Bligny, 
and  who  made  himself  sick  reading  so  much 
Hebrew. 

Another  captain  has  his  eyes  fastened  on 
the  maps  tacked  to  the  walls  of  the  shelter. 
Ah  I  This  one  has  a  little  fat  on  his  ribs  and 
a  face  blooming  with  good  health.     More- 


288  BOURRU 

over,  Bourru  recognizes  him — it  is  the  cap- 
tain that  he  has  so  often  seen  going  the 
rounds  at  night  in  the  trenches. 

"I  say,  Coradin,"  another  captain  asks 
the  first  one,  "is  the  road  good  enough  for 
me  to  send  up  shells  to  Trench  14,  at  la 
Buanthe?" 

"It  beats  all!"  thinks  Bourru.  Think  of 
there  being  a  captain  here  at  Headquarters 
who  is  talking  about  a  place  he  knows  so 
well  (though  he  would  call  it  Boelle)  and 
who  wants  to  send  shells  to  Trench  14 !  One 
by  one  the  three  captains  go  to  talk  to  a  tall 
major  who  is  walking  about  with  a  rather 
ungainly  step,  with  his  nose  in  the  air.  He 
must  be  a  bully  chap,  this  one  I  In  the  last 
five  minutes  he  has  said  twice: 

"And  whatever  you  do,  don't  worry  them, 
those  poilus;  as  long  as  they're  in  the  rest- 
camp,  give  'em  a  little  peace." 

And  he  jokes  with  everybody. 

All  of  a  sudden  the  general  comes  out  of 
an  adjoining  room. 


BOURRU  VISITS  HEADQUARTERS     289 

*'I  say,  Fontaine,"  he  asks  the  major, 
"have  you  given  notice  tliat  the  rehef  of  the 
Thirty-first  will  not  begin  before  nine 
o'clock?" 

"Yes,  general,"  answers  the  major;  "but 
here's  a  paper  a  soldier  has  just  brought  me 
— the  Twelfth  company  is  asking  for  infor- 
mation about  its  special  mission.  Lieuten- 
ant Gain  will  take  care  of  the  matter." 

The  Twelfth  company  is  Bourru's  com- 
pany, and  the  paper  is  the  one  he  just 
brought.  And  the  general  is  going  to  give 
his  attention  to  little  things  like  that! 
Bourru  stands  in  his  place,  on  the  threshold 
of  the  door,  as  if  awaiting  the  sentence  of  a 
judge  on  his  affairs.  How  simple  they  are, 
these  great  men,  when  you  are  near  tliem! 
You  see,  the  major  doesn't  stand  at  atten- 
tion when  he  talks  to  the  general,  and  for 
that  matter  all  those  officers  stand  there  talk- 
ing at  ease  under  their  log  shelter,  just  like 
X^lain  poilus.  There  is  a  lieutenant  with  the 
red  cap  of  the  Chasseurs  d'Afrique  whom 


290  BOURRU 

somebody  has  just  called  Lusarch,  and  who 
keeps  repeating  "Hello!  Hello!"  into  the 
telephone.  Bourru  is  transfixed  by  the 
scene. 

The  major,  with  his  perpetual  good 
humor,  has  caught  up  a  box  of  bonbons ;  he 
takes  one,  and  passes  them  around. 

"Have  a  bonbon,  Favre?" 

"No,  thank  you,  major." 

"Have  one,  Coradin?" 

"With  pleasure,  major." 

The  major  goes  on  till  he  comes  to  the 
general. 

"Will  you  take  one,  general?" 

"Come,  come,"  says  the  general,  "first  of- 
fer one  to  our  good  trooper  here  who  is 
waiting  for  his  answer." 

"Ah,  beg  your  pardon,  old  fellow,"  says 
the  major  as  he  holds  the  box  out  to  Bourru. 
"I  wasn't  forgetting  you,  you  know,  only  I 
offered  them  to  the  general  first  because  he 
outranks  you." 

"Not  at  all!"  cries  the  general.     "The 


BOURRU  VISITS  HEADQUARTERS     291 

plain   poilu   i:s   Number   One   among  good 
sports." 

Bourru  was  eating  his  bonbon  as  he  went 
on  his  way,  but  the  emotion  stirred  up  in  him 
by  all  these  important  events  was  so  great 
that  he  never  knew  whetlier  it  was  a  caramel 
or  a  chocolate  that  he  had  in  his  mouth. 


XXX 

AN  EXPEDITION  TO  THE  REAR 

BOURRU  began  to  feel  his  social  im- 
portance when  he  saw  the  long  line 
of     auto-trucks     which     had     been 
brought  to  take  the  regiment  to  the  rest- 
camp. 

"Well,  of  all  things!"  he  thought.  "The 
government  is  saving  leg-work.  Pretty 
fine!" 

To  tell  the  truth  the  vehicles  are  none  too 
comfortable.  But  once  you  are  installed  in 
them  and  the  procession  starts,  in  dust  and 
uproar,  at  ten  miles  an  hour, — well,  even 
if  you  are  only  in  the  fortieth  truck  from  the 
front,  you  feel  that  you  are  a  force  in  the 
world.     To  the  right  and  left  of  you  the 

292 


XPEDITION  TO  THE  REAR 

fields  and  forests  are  flying  past,  just  as  if 
you  were  splitting  them  with  a  sword-stroke. 
The  little  vehicles  of  the  peasants  get  tim- 
idly to  one  side  in  the  gutter,  and  the  people 
watch  you  pass  with  gaping  eyes. 

**Hey  there,  it*s  us,"  you  cry  to  them;  "it's 
us,  the  bo3^s  from  the  front!" 

You  seem  to  be  entering  into  an  extraor- 
dinary land.  There  is  no  longer  a  swarm  of 
men  as  at  the  front.  The  villages  look 
empty;  there  are  no  more  ruins,  no  more 
burned  houses, — all  is  calm.  Aged  peasants 
come  and  go  with  slow  steps.  The  apple  and 
ear  trees  seem  to  have  a  look  of  beneficence ; 

the  birds  sing  as  they  do  in  poetry.  Na- 
ture seems  hke  a  happy  woman  asleep. 

ourru  cannot  cease  wondering,  for  never 

he  seen  the  country  as  it  looks  to-day. 
Is  it  possible!  Certainly  tlie  country  must 
have  changed  or  he  has  become  a  different 
man,  during  the  months  he  has  spent  "up 
there."    The  last  supposition  is  the  true  one, 

ou  have  doubtless  concluded.    You  know 


■i' 

ture 


294  BOURRU 

my  Bourru  by  now — a  good  fellow  without 
the  slightest  affectation,  who  does  his  job  as 
best  he  can;  but  never,  never  has  he  had  a 
notion  of  being  a  hero.  Of  course  he  has 
read  in  the  papers  that  back  in  the  rear  peo- 
ple talk  of  the  poilus  as  heroes;  but 
pshaw!  .  .  .  He  knows  what  words  like  that 
mean, — fine  newspaper  talk,  that's  all. 

But  see  him  now!  Just  because  he  has 
gone  through  certain  villages  where  people 
were  beaming  upon  him  from  their  door- 
steps, Bourru  is  experiencing  an  extraor- 
dinary sensation ;  he  puffs  out  his  chest,  takes 
a  deep  breath — at  the  risk  of  swallowing  still 
more  dust — and  discovers  that,  honestly,  he 
is  pretty  much  pleased  when  a  gamin,  after 
coming  close  enough  to  read  a  number  on 
his  collar,  cries  out  in  admiration,  "It's  the 
back  from  the  trenches!" 

At  one  place  where  the  convoy  stops,  an 
old  woman  exclaims,  in  a  sympathetic  voice: 

"Ah,  my  poor  boys !  You're  coming  from 
— th  Regiment — a  fighting  regiment  just 


AN  EXPEDITION  TO  THE  REAR     295 

the   battle    and    you   must    soon   go    back 
to  it!" 

The  trucks  are  surrounded  by  little  girls, 
women,  and  old  men,  and  at  the  sight  of  all 
these  inquiring  and  sympathetic  civilians,  the 
soldiers  begin  to  realize  that  they  have  really 
come  from  a  place  where  not  everyone  has 
been.  Honestly,  they  had  forgotten  the  fact. 
When  you  are  daily  elbowing  such  numbers 
of  comrades  "up  there,**  you  can  easily  fancy 
that  your  sector  is  the  whole  world  and  that 
it  is  a  very  ordinary  place  to  live  in.  Not  at 
all;  tlie  front  now  appears  to  the  men  as  a 
sort  of  sinister  and  grandiose  work-shop 
re  only  a  chosen  class — their  own — is 
permitted  to  pursue  the  terrible  task  in 
d. 

Honest,  little  chicken,**  Iluguenin  is  say- 
to  a  frail  young  girl,  "if  you  went  up 
there,  you*d  drop  dead  just  from  breathing 
the  air." 

And  then  the  poilus  discover  another  cause 
pride,  that  of  being  covered  with  dust, 


296  BOURRU 

and  having  bronzed  faces  and  rough  hands. 
They  cast  glances  of  pity  at  the  well- 
groomed  little  civilians  whom  they  meet  in 
the  towns.  My,  aren't  they  ridiculous  in 
their  straw  hats?    Look  at  them! 

But  it  is  in  the  village  where  they  are  to 
pass  their  fortnight  that  Bourru  and  his  fel- 
lows really  come  to  know  the  state  of  mind 
of  the  knight,  returned  from  the  Crusade, 
who  used  to  stretch  himself  out  at  his  ease 
and  wait  for  his  womenfolk  and  servants  to 
take  care  of  him.  The  constable  is  the  cause 
of  it.  This  honorable  functionary,  a  rotund 
little  old  man,  in  a  suit  of  yellow  alpaca,  pos- 
sesses a  soldierly  and  forceful  mind.  The 
first  of  these  qualities  is  evinced  by  the  me- 
daille  militaire  which  decorates  his  breast, 
and  the  second  is  revealed  in  the  white  tuft 
on  his  chin  which,  when  he  holds  his  head 
high,  seems  to  point  like  a  sword.  He 
adores  the  poilus,  does  this  retired  colonial 
soldier,  and  he  intends  that  his  village  shall 
entertain  them  worthily.    With  fine  gestures 


AN  EXPEDITION  TO  THE  REAR     297 

and  much  eloquence  he  declares  to  the  com- 
manding officer  that  the  troopers  shall  have 
fine  barns,  good  straw,  and  even  some  beds 
— yes,  actual  beds! 

But  there  is  one  little  difficulty.  In  this 
village,  far  back  from  the  front,  there  is  a 
repair  station  for  automobiles,  and  these  gen- 
tlemen— that  is,  the  automobile  mechanics — 
have  brought  hither — of  course,  you  mustn't 
tell  any  one  this — have  secretly  brought 
hither  their  wives.  Don't  let  it  worry  you — 
they  are  just  old  men,  nothing  but  old  me- 
chanics; they  hold  to  their  old  habits,  you 
know,  and  then,  too,  it  brings  money  into 
the  village.  But  the  constable  cannot  per- 
mit them  to  keep  possession  of  all  the  avail- 
able beds,  and  he  is  already  entering  the 
houses  one  after  another  and  bringing  out, 
somewhat  noisily,  a  considerable  group  of 
scared  little  ladies.  The  poilus,  in  their  good 
nature,  may  protest  as  they  please  against 
disturbing  any  one,  the  constable  will  have 
his  own  way,  and  he  continues  crying  out: 


298  BOURRU 

"These  boys  have  come  back  from  the 
front,  and  I  tell  you  I'm  going  to  put  them 
up  hke  princes  1'' 

You  can  easily  understand  that  a  recep- 
tion of  this  sort  goes  to  a  man's  head  like 
a  glass  of  brandy.  My  Bourru  and  his  fel- 
lows literally  take  possession  of  the  village, 
establishing  themselves  as  masters  in  its 
houses. 

"Hey  there,  old  girl,  don't  you  want  to 
make  us  an  omelette?  And  since  your 
kitchen  suits  us  perfectly,  we'll  just  stay  in 
it." 

The  streets  are  full  of  them.  Standing  in 
the  middle  they  chat  and  laugh  as  long  as 
they  like;  some  gesticulate  and  make  loud 
mirth.  Do  you  wonder  why?  Just  look  at 
that  group  of  girls  coming  up  the  street — 
what  would  they  think  if  a  man  didn't  set  his 
cap  on  one  side  like  a  bold  warrior  and  throw 
them  a  few  jaunty  words  as  they  pass? 
Surely  they  would  be  vexed ! 

And  then,  one  is  entitled  to  some  fun 


AN  EXPEDITION  TO  THE  REAR     299 

when  one  has  just  got  back  from  the  front, 
what?  After  all,  if  the  houses  are  still  stand- 
ing here,  if  the  crops  are  ripening  in  peace, 
it  is  we  who  are  the  reason  for  it.  Women 
are  working  in  the  fields  and — well,  that's 
natural  enough!  In  the  days  of  old — we 
have  read  it  in  the  History  of  France — the 
women  did  all  the  manual  labor,  while  the 
warriors  conserved  their  powers  for  noble 
exploits.  Since  the  war  is  still  going  on,  let's 
get  back  to  the  old  traditions!  Come,  you 
civilians,  you've  never  heard  a  shell  explode 
— so  down  on  your  knees  before  us  I 

"Another  omelette  and  three  bottles  of 
red  ink!"  cry  Huguenin,  Bourru,  and  their 
comrades,  who  have  installed  themselves  in 
the  house  of  a  good  old  lady  and  are  satis- 
fying their  needs  like  kings. 

Can  you  see  them,  our  poilus  of  1916? 
They  demonstrate  tlieir  kinsliip  witli  tlie  La 
Tulipes,  the  Tranche-Montagnes,  the  Brin 
d' Amours,  and  with  all  those  old  Knights- 
at-arms  of  the  fifteenth  century  who  used 


300  BOURRU 

to  crush  the  "bourgeois"  with  their  scorn 
when  they  were  passing  through  the  city 
streets.  It  is,  indeed,  a  social  problem  that 
is  raised  in  this  village,  and  a  philosopher 
would  hasten  to  put  on  his  goggles  to  study 
the  phenomena  of  this  revival  of  a  military 
psychology  supposed  obsolete. 

A  tender  heart,  inspired  by  the  famous 
saying  Cedant  arma  togae,  might  take  pity 
on  these  poor  civilians  molested  by  a  brutal 
soldiery.  It  would  be  quite  wrong;  and  to 
prove  the  fact,  just  listen  to  the  good  old 
peasant-woman,  as  with  countless  polite 
phrases  she  accompanies  Huguenin,  Bourru, 
and  their  friends  to  their  abodes : 

"Yes,  I'll  only  charge  you  thirty  sous  for 
the  omelette  and  twenty  for  the  red  ink,  be- 
cause it's  you  and  you've  just  got  back  from 
the  front  J  and  don't  forget  to  come  again." 


XXXI 


THOUGHT  OF  THOSE  WHO 
REMAINED  OX  THE  HH.L 


BOURRU  is  now  serving  on  another 
sector,  and  a  new  existence  has  be- 
gun for  him.  But  often  his  thoughts 
hover  over  the  region  of  Vauquois,  where 
lie  lived  through  long  months  of  the  war. 
Thanks  to  the  distance,  he  can  see  more 
clearly  now  what  his  merits  were,  and  a  cer- 
tain look  of  pride  comes  into  his  eyes  when 
he  recalls  some  episode  of  the  combats  in 
which  he  had  a  part;  but  it  is  still  a  very 
childlike  pride.  If  our  trooper  meets  a 
boastful  soldier  from  another  sector  he  al- 
's  lets  the  other  do  the  talking;  Bourru 
not  seek  to  extol  his  own  exploits,  for 

301 


302  BOURRU 

he  believes  that  everybody  else  has  done  as 
well  as  he.  Also,  it  is  not  a  feeling  of  ar- 
rogance that  comes  over  him  when  his  imagi- 
nation carries  him  back  to  Vauquois ;  no,  he 
only  thinks  of  the  good  comrades  whom  he 
has  left  on  the  hill,  struck  down  by  death. 
He  is  afraid  that  the  men  of  the  division  that 
replaced  his  own  do  not  feel  tenderly  enough 
toward  the  graves  there.  How  could  they? 
For  these  new  soldiers  of  Vauquois  the 
names  inscribed  on  the  crosses  will  call  up 
no  exact  picture — no  impulse  will  spring  up 
in  their  hearts  when  they  read  the  names  of 
Goupy,  Bouys,  Revel,  Chartier.  That  is 
why  Bourru  loves  to  make  a  pilgrimage,  in 
thought,  to  the  graves  in  his  old  sector. 

First,  those  in  the  forest.  There  were 
some  of  them  at  almost  every  point — at 
Mamelon  Blanc,  at  Allieux,  at  the  Barri- 
cade. During  the  last  months  of  his  stay  it 
was  in  this  cemetery  that  all  the  dead  at  Vau- 
quois were  buried.  The  ceremonies  were 
very   simple.     In  the   early  morning  the 


THOSE  WHO  REMAINED  303 

stretcher-bearers  would  go  out  there  under 
the  trees,  where  the  bodies  brought  down 
during  the  night  were  awaiting  their  last 
rites.  Each  body  was  placed  in  a  trench  dug 
in  advance.  Then  a  wooden  cross  was  fixed 
in  the  ground,  bearing  a  name ;  though  some- 
times there  was  no  name,  because  the  tor- 
pedo, on  exploding,  had  left  of  a  group  of 
^oldiers  nothing  but  unrecognizable  fr ag- 
ents. Under  the  great  trees  these  com- 
rades of  Bourru  are  sleeping.  Sometimes 
the  graves  were  placed  here  and  there  in  the 
bivouac.  Bourru  remembers  the  four 
mounds  near  the  kitchens,  on  the  skirt  of  the 
wrest — they  were  right  in  the  line  of  a  path. 
For  months  men  in  thousands  took  the 
trouble  to  make  a  little  detour  in  order  not 

to  walk  over  them. 

«  «  «  «  « 

In  the  rear  cantonments,  the  wounded 
men  who  had  died  in  the  ambulance  were 
buried  in  the  village  cemeteries.  At  Froidos 
the  dead  were  carefully  laid  to  rest  in  one 


304  BOURRU 

great  trench.  Crosses  marked  the  names  of 
the  soldiers  and  the  dates  of  their  deaths; 
and  maps  of  the  cemetery  were  kept  in  the 
mayor's  office  and  in  the  records  of  the  am- 
bulance corps.  How  cold  they  seemed,  these 
graves  laid  out  by  the  administration!  All 
that  saved  them  from  the  appearance  of  a 
work-yard  were  the  flowers  that  comrades 
brought  during  days  of  rest. 

Bourru  had  more  affection  for  the  graves 
of  September,  1914.  How  much  more  mov- 
ing! Buried  on  the  spot  where  they  had 
fallen,  the  soldiers  of  the  Marne  sleep  in  the 
lap  of  Nature.  Often  it  is  on  the  summit  of 
a  ridge,  dominating  the  landscape,  that  their 
crosses  arrest  the  passer-by  and  constrain 
him  to  meditation.  Bourru  took  pleasure  in 
the  fancy  that,  at  night,  these  victors  could 
still  look  forward  to  the  line  of  the  Argonne, 
the  stout  wall  defending  the  land  of  dreams 
against  the  barbarians. 

At  Rarecourt  the  praiseworthy  effort  to 
aid  relatives  in  finding  the  glorious  dust  of 


THOSE  WHO  RE:\rAIXED  305 

their  dear  ones  had  been  carried  to  a  point 
touching  in  its  devotion.  Each  soldier  who 
died  at  Salvange  had  his  own  grave;  on  the 
cross  were  crowns,  plates,  and  even  photo- 
graphs sent  by  his  relatives.  There  the 
ancient  rnilitarj'  rites  were  observed  with 
perfect  regularity.  The  bier  of  the  humblest 
soldier  was  always  accompanied  by  a  priest, 
a  guard  of  honor,  ^nd  the  commanding  offi- 
cer from  Teil  representing  the  general  of 
the  army  corps.  I'hey  were  not  willing  that 
a  grave  should  be  closed  before  honor  had 
been  done  to  the  dead  comrade  by  his  broth- 

in  arms.  The  inhabitants  of  the  village 
made  it  their  duty  to  honor  these  sol- 
diers who  had  fallen  in  defence  of  their 
soil.  Women  and  young  girls  were  present 
at  all  the  burials,  and  a  pensive  melancholy 
rested  on  the  grave  faces  of  the  ^leuse 
people. 

All  these  graves  in  the  rear  villages,  at 
Auzeville,  at  Jubecourt,  at  Ville-sur-Cou- 

ce,  at  Julvccourt,  were  constantly  tended 


306  BOURRU 

by  the  soldiers  on  their  days  of  rest.  Moss, 
boughs  of  trees,  and  flowers  were  placed  on 
them,  and  crosses  were  built  up  with  bricks 
piled  together.  Now  that  he  is  far  away, 
Bourru  understands  more  fully  what  mean- 
ing underlay  all  this  care  for  the  graves.  It 
answered  a  need  of  the  heart.  A  struggle 
was  in  progress  against  oblivion,  an  affect- 
ing struggle  in  which  man  makes  use  of 
every  symbol  to  provide  against  the  indiffer- 
ence of  the  future.  Therefore  these  crowns, 
these  flowers,  these  classic  palms  that  speak 
in  honor  of  the  dead;  therefore  these  frag- 
ments of  shell,  objects  that  commemorate 
glory  in  arms ;  therefore  these  crosses,  which 
tell  of  the  resurrection.  There  are  no  heavy 
stones  here  to  seal  the  tombs  and  protect 
them  against  possible  profanation.  One  ex- 
erts himself  to  supply  their  place  with  en- 
closures made  of  boughs  of  trees,  sometimes 
forming  constructions  of  a  strange  style. 
It  is  the  name,  above  all,  that  the  comrades 
desire  to  save  from  oblivion.     This  name. 


THOSE  WHO  REMAINED  307 

therefore,  is  inscribed  on  the  cross,  on  the 
plates,  and  even  written  on  a  piece  of  paper 
and  placed  in  a  bottle  left  at  the  foot  of  the 
cross.  Men  of  the  future,  will  j^ou  know  how 
to  honor  these  glorious  names  which  a  wild 
desire  to  conquer  oblivion  now  bequeaths  to 
you? 

Shortly  before  leaving  the  sector,  Bourru 
was  at  Brocourt.  lie  remembered  tliat  on 
the  outskirts  of  the  village  two  otTicers  of 
the  regiment  had  been  buried  underneath  the 
pines  that  spread  their  broken,  tragic 
boughs.  What  a  fine  romantic  scene  it 
would  make,  at  a  later  day,  when  the  mold 
of  time  should  have  gathered  over  the 
tombs  I 

But  the  battle  of  Verdun  had  been  felt  as 
far  back  as  this,  and  in  place  of  lonely  graves 
he  found  a  great  cemetery.  Two  roads 
passed  by  it,  filled  with  long  lines  of  trucks 
and  with  troops  on  the  march.  A  few 
strands  of  wire  separated  the  enclosure  of 
the  dead  from  the  highway  where  the  living 


308  BOURRU 

were  pressing  on.  Or  was  it  a  separation? 
Morally,  at  least,  there  was  none.  One  went 
into  the  cemetery  as  into  a  familiar  place; 
in  passing,  each  man  offered  a  brief  salute  to 
the  crosses,  or  perhaps  merely  lowered  his 
voice ;  others  paused  a  moment  in  silence  be- 
fore a  mound.  Bourru  heard  one  man  say 
to  the  others  with  him,  "He  is  over  there, 
the  old  man;"  and  they  took  their  way  to- 
ward the  grave  as  if  an  old  friend  was  await- 
ing them  with  outstretched  hands.  It  even 
happened  that  certain  wags  would  choose 
their  own  places,  declaring  that  in  a  ceme- 
tery so  full  of  life  a  man  would  hardly  know 
he  was  dead. 

There  was  nothing  shocking  in  such  fa- 
miliarity. Every  word  and  every  gesture 
were  in  harmonious  accord,  as  it  seemed,  to 
say  to  the  comrades  who  were  sleeping: 
"You  see  we  are  here,  close  to  you ;  you  are 
not  the  dreadful  things  that  are  heard  of 
in  tales  of  ghosts;  we  know  you  well,  and 
that  is  why  we  love  you.    Rest  easy — the  soil 


THOSE  WHO  REMAINED  309 

that  shelters  you  shall  always  remain 
French." 

Once  a  visitor  desired  to  express  more 
clearly  the  feelings  that  were  moving  him, 
and  in  his  awkward  way  wrote  with  a  pencil 
on  one  of  the  crosses:  "Rest  in  peace,  old 
man;  we'll  take  revenge  for  you."  And  it 
seemed  as  if  those  that  lay  huried  made  signs 
of  friendship  and  encouragement. 

Seeing  all  these  things,  Bourru  would  re- 
member the  old  priest  in  his  village,  who,  in 
his  sermons,  spoke  so  often  of  the  commun- 
ion between  the  dead  and  the  living.  Was 
this  not  a  new  witness  of  the  truth?  The 
soldier  going  into  battle  was  receiving  inspi- 
ration at  the  graves  of  his  comrades,  from 
whom  emanated  an  irresistible  power  to 
urge  the  hero  to  sacrifice. 

*  *  m  *  0 

Bourru  loves  to  think  thus  of  his  dead 
comrades  left  behind  forever. 

He  knows  now  how  great  was  their  in- 
fluence over  him.     In  the  cities  of  old  the 


310  BOURRU 

dead  were  buried  in  the  center  of  the  town, 
and  the  cemeteries  served  as  places  for  pub- 
lic assemblies  as  for  family  gatherings.  The 
Christian  church,  in  order  to  make  the  in- 
fluence of  the  dead  still  more  forceful,  bu- 
ried them  in  the  very  temples.  Eternal  repe- 
tition of  history!  To-day  in  our  towns  in 
the  war-zone  we  have  revived  the  ancient 
custom.  We  do  not  exile  our  dead  to  som- 
ber places  set  apart;  on  the  contrary  we 
keep  them  very  close  to  us.  They  are  our 
loved  ones,  and  their  place  of  rest  is  in  the 
garden  where  we  walk  and  receive  mute 
counsel  from  them. 

The  front,  for  the  poets  of  the  future,  will 
be  a  long  line  of  glory  winding  its  path  of 
light  across  the  land  of  France.  For 
Bourru  it  will  be  the  great  work-shop  where 
one  toiled  hard  for  the  achievement  of  a  holy 
duty.  Because  comrades  of  his  met  death 
at  the  task,  that  work- shop  will  become,  in 
the  future,  like  one  of  those  cathedrals  where 
one  does  not  enter  except  with  bare  head 


THOSE  WHO  REMAINED  311 

bowing  in  respectful  devotion.  As  on  the 
days  when  over  the  slabs  covering  the  tombs 
in  the  old  church  at  Bligny  the  living  march 
forward  singing  Magnificats  and  Hosan- 
nahs,  so  the  time  will  come  when  Bourru  will 
honor  his  dead  comrades  and  will  draw  from 
the  memory  of  them  new  powers  for  life. 


PART   TWO 
WAR  UXDERGROUND 


AN  ENCOUNTER  UNDERGROUND 

AT  that  particular  moment  tlie  one  idea 
of  Flanient,  the  saj^per,  was  to  d\<^ 
fast.  You,  too,  in  his  place,  would 
not  have  thought  of  mucli  else.  As  soon  as 
are  at  the  bottom  of  that  tunnel,  less 
n  a  yard  deep  and  about  as  wide,  you 
nt  to  get  out  of  it.  Just  imagine!  forty 
yards  of  earth  on  top  of  you!  You  cannot 
fancy  the  feeling  it  gives  you!  Oh,  I  know, 
B  course,  that  as  soon  as  you  think  of  the 
sapper  in  his  underground  hole  you  shud- 
der and  say,  "Yes,  I  see  it  all — it's  hor- 
rible." 

And  you  close  your  eyes  the  better  to  con- 
jure up  the  sensations   of  one   scratching 

315 


316  BOURRU 

away  forty  yards  under  the  earth.  Ah,  no! 
you  do  not  see  it  all.  In  vain  you  envelop 
your  soul  in  a  great  shroud  of  shadows  and 
of  silence;  in  vain  your  flesh  creeps  at 
thought  of  the  dank  chill,  your  arms  move 
instinctively  to  ward  off  the  falling  clods, 
your  bosom  heaves  as  though  struggling 
against  suffocation — useless  efforts!  All 
these  exertions  of  the  imagination  do  not 
make  you  feel  what  it  is  to  have  forty  yards 
of  earth  over  your  head;  it  is  heavy,  crush- 
ing, terrible!  One  is  confined  here  like  an 
old  man  who  has  reached  the  low  grounds 
toward  which  he  has  been  traveling  for  a 
hundred  years  of  life,  but  who  is  still  looking 
back  toward  those  heights  of  the  past,  the 
sunlit  days  of  his  youth. 

In  proportion  as  the  descent  is  made  into 
the  shaft,  so  narrow  that  a  fat  man  could  not 
get  through  it,  the  impression  grows  that  the 
strata  of  earth  are  weighing  down  one  upon 
another.  Ten  yards  down  we  are  still  in  the 
shaft,  which  is  made  of  a  clay  as  hard  as 


AN  ENCOUNTER  UNDERGROUND  317 

rock;  thence  a  passage  through  which  we 
have  to  crawl  brings  us  to  another  shaft. 
Climbing  down  the  rope  ladder  we  traverse 
another  zone  lined  with  a  moist,  black  clay. 
The  clamorous  life  of  the  upper  day  is  al- 
ready far  behind  I  Deeper  yet,  we  cross  the 
belt  of  green  sand;  and  then,  at  last,  forty 
yards  down,  we  find  ourselves — little  mov- 
ing objects  lost  in  the  immensity  of  inei-t 
matter — in  the  upper  section  of  the  Jurassic 
stratum.  A  vague,  superstitious  fear  seizes 
the  most  skeptical  minds.  "What  if  it  be  liv- 
ing, this  matter  upon  whose  eternal  silence 
we  are  intruding!  And  who  knows?  Our 
presence  might,  perhaps,  enrage  mysterious 
forces  here.  These  successive  beds  of  clay 
that  your  pick  is  attacking — if  you  should 
disturb  their  equilibrium  a  landslide  might 
follow  and  drag  us  down  to  the  depths  of 
some  subterranean  gulf.  True,  the  tunnel  is 
**boxed  in,"  that  is  to  say,  boarded  with 
strong  planks,  but  what  a  pitiful  bulwark 
against   these   mighty   masses,    dense    and 


318  BOURRU 

rugged,  which  are  pulled  incessantly  toward 
the  center  of  the  globe ! 

Ah,  that  sullen  force  of  nature  lying  con- 
stantly in  wait  for  you;  like  a  menace,  the 
miner  senses  it  on  his  bosom,  on  his  back,  and 
in  his  limbs. 

Is  it  that,  or  the  lack  of  oxygen,  which  is 
the  cause  of  that  uneasiness  from  which  Fla- 
ment  suffers  so  much  that,  against  his  will, 
he  stops  from  time  to  time  to  breathe  deeply? 

Behind  him  Surelle  is  putting  the  loose 
earth  into  the  sacks. 

*'One  more  hour  of  grubbing,  old  man,  and 
our  job  will  be  done." 

Suddenly  Flament's  pick  sinks  into  a  bit 
of  earth  which  gives  way  esLsily ;  a  black  hole 
appears  in  the  glimmering  light  of  the 
candle. 

"Hello,  a  fissure,"  thinks  the  sapper,  for 
he  has  learned  that  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Jurassic  stratum  there  sometimes  exist  huge 
hollow  spaces  dating  from  the  epoch  of  the 
great  geological  disturbances. 


AN  ENCOUNTER  UNDERGROUND     319 

But  you  have  to  be  careful — it  may  be  a 
tunnel  of  the  enemy.  Who  knows?  The}' 
liave  heard  something  and  are  lying  in  wait, 
perhaps.  Flament  puts  out  his  candle  and 
listens — but  hears  not  a  sound.  It  must  be 
a  natural  fissure.  He  enlarges  the  hole  and 
can  now  pass  his  licad  througli  it;  but  it  is 
not  yet  wise  to  light  tlie  candle.  He 
stretclies  out  his  arm  in  the  dark  but  touches 
nothing.  However,  he  must  see. 
|H|Strike  a  matcli,  and  put  it  out  right 
away,"  is  Surelle's  advice. 

lament  has  seen.    Xo  doubt  about  it — it 

enemy  tunnel;  on  the  opposite  wall 

e  were  traces  of  the  pick.    What  danger 

may  this  hole  be  hiding?     Is  it  occupied? 

Isn't  it  near  a  mine  ready  to  go  off? 

*'It   doesn't   look   good   to   me,"    Surelle 

agrees.    "Let's  get  Lieutenant  Montazeau." 

he  lieutenant  arrives.    He  has  taken  off 

boots,  for  the  soles  might  scrape  along 

e  planks  and  make  a  noise;  he  advances  on 

fours  in  the  narrow  tunnel.    Do  not  try 


m 

may 

Isn'i 

"] 

agre 

V 


320  BOURRU 

to  see  him;  it  is  darker  here  than  you  have 
ever  imagined.  Beside  you,  behind,  before, 
the  darkness  is  Hke  a  huge  mass;  you  seem 
to  be  moving  through  a  yielding  sub- 
stance; sight  is  a  superfluous  sense;  your 
whole  being  is  concentrated  in  the  faculty 
of  hearing;  you  close  your  eyes  to  hear  the 
better. 

"Can  you  hear  the  digging  close  by,  lieu- 
tenant?" says  Flament,  who  is  following  the 
officer. 

Ah!  that  terrible  nightmare  of  the  "toe, 
toe"  of  the  enemy's  pick!  It  continually 
hammers  upon  the  ear  of  the  miner,  like 
throbbing  pulse-beats.  It  has  to  be  banished 
by  sheer  will-power  or  it  would  nail  him  to 
the  spot,  motionless,  silent,  breathless, 
doomed  to  listen  indefinitely  without  ever 
knowing  whether  it  be  reality  or  an  illusion 
which  thus  unmans  him.  Possibly  the  enemy 
sapper,  absent  a  moment  ago,  has  returned 
and  resumed  his  work.  But  no — not  a 
sound. 


■i 


AN  ENCOUNTER  UNDERGROUND  321 

At  last  Lieutenant  Montazeau  arrives  at 
the  end  of  the  tunnel.  He  feels  around;  yes, 
here  is,  indeed,  a  hole  measuring  half  a  yard. 
Very  gently  he  passes  his  head  through  it, 
looks  about,  and  listens.  Nothing  but  shad- 
ows and  silence.  The  electric  flashlight  re- 
als the  tunnel. 

*Go  quick,  and  tell  some  one  to  bring  a 
charge;  we  must  plant  a  blast.  I'll  stay 
here." 

The  order  was  but  the  reflex  act  of  a  good 
sapper.  Is  an  enemy's  tunnel  discovered  i 
Quick!  build  a  mine-chamber,  a  wall  of 
sand-bags  in  front,  the  charge  of  explosives 
leaned  against  the  wall,  then  a  good  wad- 
ding of  sand-bags  behind,  a  layer  of  melinite 
which  reaches  to  the  top  of  the  chamber,  a 
fuse — and  there  you  have  an  enemy's  tun- 
nel mined ;  that  is  to  say,  torn  to  pieces. 

But  this  is  no  rapid  operation.  While  the 
soldiers  are  going  back  for  the  explosives  and 
the  sand-bags,  the  lieutenant  remains.  Peer- 
ing into  the  enemy's  tunnel  he  reconnoiters 


322  BOURRU 

with  care — greatly  excited.  What  luck !  but 
also  what  a  risk!  It  is  impossible  that  the 
Bodies  will  not  soon  discover  the  inroad  on 
their  tunnel,  for  they  are  sure  to  make  fre- 
quent rounds. 

An  hour  passes.  The  lieutenant  listens 
and  watches,  too,  for  a  light  may  possibly 
appear.  Hark!  What  is  that?  Shining 
circles  are  dancing  in  the  darkness — is  it 
mere  hallucination?  You  can  tell  by  rub- 
bing your  eyes.    But  the  lights  are  still  there. 

This  time  it  is,  indeed,  real;  there,  per- 
haps thirty  feet  away,  a  light  passed  at  the 
end  of  the  tunnel  and  human  shapes  crept 
along.  The  German  petty-officer  is  making 
his  rounds.  He  is  going  to  visit  the  branch 
where  the  lieutenant  is  listening.  In  fact, 
the  light,  which  seemed  to  be  disappearing 
down  a  transverse  tunnel,  is  returning.  A 
discussion  follows.  Are  they  going  to  come? 
Yes?    No? 

Yes.  Now  the  lieutenant  sees  the  light 
making  its  way  towards  him ;  soon  he  makes 


AN  ENCOUNTER  UNDERGROUND  323 

out  the  German's  face,  red  in  the  lamp-light 
and  glistening  with  sweat — for  it  is  hot  in 
here.  The  lieutenant,  too,  is  warm;  he  has 
thrust  an  arm  through  the  hole  and  is  hold- 
ing his  revolver  pointed  at  the  enemy,  with 
the  butt  against  tlie  earth.  The  Boche  is 
still  coming  on,  with  two  men  following  be- 
hind him.  There  is  nothing  to  do  but  shoot. 
It  is  horril)le  to  kill  a  man  this  way;  here  it 
is  eighteen  months  that  the  lieutenant  has 
been  waging  war  underground,  but  one 
would  never  guess  it — he  is  almost  trem- 
bling. His  head  is  indiscernible  against  the 
of  the  tunnel — half  a  yard  more  and 

Boche  will  see  him.    He,  too,  has  a  re- 

er. 

ver  their  heads,  forty  yards  up,  there  is 
calm  day;  neither  grenades  nor  trench-mor- 
tars are  at  work.  From  the  bottom  of  the 
trench  the  poilus  are  watching  the  swallows 
wheeling  gracefully  in  the  sunlight.  Not 
one  of  the  birds  is  troubled  in  his  happy 
life.    Down  below,  the  Boche  is  gasping  his 


324  BOURRU 

last;  the  two  men  who  were  following  him 
are  fleeing  like  frightened  rats  and  the  lieu- 
tenant is  yelling  out  orders. 

"Hurry  up!  Bring  the  sacks  of  ched- 
dite!  .  .  .  There  are  only  six — never  mind; 
it's  enough.    Come  on!    Stuff  it  in!" 

And  the  sacks  of  explosive  are  dumped 
headlong  into  the  enemy's  tunnel — beside  the 
Boche,  who  is  still  groaning.  Quickly  the 
fuse  is  placed,  at  the  opening  of  the  pit; 
forty  yards  above,  a  non-commissioned  offi- 
cer touches  it  off,  while  the  lieutenant  wipes 
his  brow  as  though  waking  from  a  bad 
dream. 

The  shock  was  not  even  discernible,  so 
tiny  had  been  the  charge!  It  required  an 
effort  of  the  imagination  to  believe  that, 
down  below,  the  body  of  a  man  was  firmly 
wedged  in  the  earth,  to  sleep  there  through 
the  centuries — unless  another  explosion 
should  come  to  shatter  it  and  mingle  it  still 
more  closely  with  the  soil. 


II 

A  RESCUE 


CAPTAIN  LAIGNIER,  of  the  En- 
gineers, was  in  the  shelter  which 
served  as  his  headquarters  when  the 
shock  came.  A  mine  had  just  exploded. 
That  does  not  mean  tliat  there  was  a  great 
detonation;  no,  not  a  sound  was  perceptible 
in  the  grottoes  thirty  feet  under  the  ground. 
One  only  saw  the  walls  of  the  cavern  swing 
like  those  of  a  ship  tossed  by  a  tempest;  the 
supporting  timbers  groaned  and  cracked  and 
seemed  ready  to  fall;  but  hardly  was  there 
time  to  think  "I  am  lost"  before  the  hill  had 
already  regained  its  immobility, 
j^taignier  rushes  outside.  All  the  tunnels 
01  the  position  are  his  domain ;  since  he  has 

325 


326  BOURRU 

not  ordered  any  charge  set  off  on  our  side  it 
must  have  been  a  Boche  mine  that  just  ex- 
ploded. On  his  arrival  at  the  front  line 
he  is  at  once  addressed  by  a  sapper  on 
guard. 

"Nothing  to  be  seen  outside,  captain." 

Which  means  that  nothing  has  broken  the 
surface  of  the  earth.  It  is  a  mere  blast  some- 
where within  the  underground  maze,  but 
what  has  caused  it? 

Laignier  knows  all  the  entrances  to  the 
shafts,  which  are  numbered  P',  P',  E',  E', 
etc.;  he  runs  from  one  to  the  other.  At  P^ 
the  sapper  informs  him,  "It  must  be  some- 
where around  P'',  at  5/51." 

And  sure  enough,  at  the  moment  when  the 
captain  arrives  at  P^°  they  are  bringing  a 
half-fainting  corporal  out  of  the  shaft.  It 
requires  little  effort  to  imagine  what  has 
taken  place.  The  enemy  has  blasted  one  of 
our  tunnels;  the  gases,  creeping  through  a 
wall,  have  spread  through  the  whole  system 
of  tunnels — a  terrible  fate  for  those  who  have 


A  RESCUE  327 

been  surprised,  for  nitrous  gases  overwhelm 
a  man  in  three  breaths. 

The  sappers  have  come  to  know  its  effect 
thorouglily  during  the  eighteen  months  that 
they  have  been  engaged  here  in  subterranean 
warfare;  the  effect  is  an  asphyxiation  which, 
tliough  slow  enough  in  bringing  death,  com- 
plctel}'  overpowers  a  man's  limbs  and  leaves 
the  unfortunate  miner  inert,  like  a  i)undle  of 
rags,  at  the  end  of  the  tunnel  where  he  has 
been  at  work.  Those  who  have  been  revived 
tell  afterwards  that  at  the  time  the  mind  re- 
mains to  a  certain  extent  active — the  will  ex- 
erts itself  to  command  the  muscles  to  flight, 
but  all  in  vain;  you  seem  to  be  stuck  fast  in 
the  tunnel  where  you  are  stiffled  if  you  open 
your  moutli  to  cry  for  help.  It  is  obvious 
that  there  is  no  time  to  lose  if  we  are  to  save 
those  comrades  who  are  gasping  thirty  or 
forty  yards  underground.  3Ioreover,  a  sap- 
per never  hesitates.  From  the  moment  w^hen 
there  appears  at  the  entrance  to  a  pit  a  sig- 
nal that  a  soldier  has  been  caught  in  a  tunnel, 


328  BOURRU 

there  takes  place  acts  of  devotion  which  will 
some  day  bring  tears  of  admiration  to  the 
eyes  of  our  grandchildren. 

Imagine  the  setting.  Under  a  shelter, 
open  slender  shafts  about  thirty  inches  in 
diameter,  sinking  vertically  into  the  ground. 
You  go  down  into  them  by  a  rope  ladder. 
When,  in  a  moment  of  calm,  you  who  are 
uninitiated  bend  over  the  shaft  where  a  can- 
dle burning  at  the  bottom  is  but  a  tiny  flick- 
ering spark  amid  the  shadows  of  that  gulf, 
you  cannot  refrain  from  recoiling  instinc- 
tively, so  profound  is  the  horror  that  rises 
from  below.  But  if  there  has  been  an  ex- 
plosion, it  is  more  than  mental  horror  that 
rises;  the  nitrous  gases  escape  in  rapid  ex- 
halations and  sometimes  men  who  were  only 
leaning  over  the  opening  have  inhaled  their 
death. 

Be  that  as  it  may,  the  first  sapper  to  ar- 
rive does  not  hesitate ;  about  his  body  he  fas- 
tens a  cord,  gives  the  end  to  the  soldier  on 
guard,  and  descends.     Often,  after  a  few 


A  RESCUE  329 

yards,  when  he  feels  himself  overcome,  he 
pulls  the  cord,  in  token  that  he  can  go  no 
further.  He  is  pulled  up  and  another  un- 
dertakes the  task. 

This  was  what  had  happened  at  the  mo- 
ment of  Laignier's  arrival  at  P'°.  Already 
three  sappers  had  gone  down,  only  to  be 
withdrawn,  half-asphj'xiated.  Stretched  out 
beside  the  entrance  of  the  pit,  they  were 
vomiting  and  struggling  under  the  effects  of 
the  terrible  poison. 

"Captain,"  a  soldier  immediately  ex- 
plained, *'it  is  Lieutenant  R and  Ser- 
geant C who  are  down  there;  we  can 

hear  them  gasp." 

Ah,  the  power  of  instinctive  devotion  mov- 
ing the  soul  of  a  brave  man!  This  captain 
in  command  of  the  engineers  so  well  knows 
the  danger  of  such  a  rescue  tliat  he  has  for- 
bidden anyone  to  go  down  into  the  shafts, 
in  such  a  case,  without  a  rope  attached  to 
him  and  without  an  oxygen-tank,  and  he 
punishes  severely  those  who  disobey  that  or- 


330  BOURRU 

der.  But  before  those  present  have  time  to 
interfere,  Laignier  has  taken  off  the  tunic 
which  might  impede  his  movements,  and 
without  oxygen,  without  a  rope  about  his 
body,  without  uttering  a  word,  he  descends 
into  the  pit. 

"It's  madness,  captain;  stop!"  they  cry  to 
him. 

The  officer  does  not  hear. 

What  happens  in  the  depths  of  the  tun- 
nel? By  employing  certain  arts  of  narra- 
tion which  he  will  hardly  reproach  me  for — 
for  I  know  that  this  busy  soldier  never  has 
time  to  read  a  book — I  believe  I  can  recon- 
struct the  scene. 

At  the  bottom  of  the  shaft  there  is  the 
entrance  to  a  horizontal  tunnel,  where  one 
is  obliged  to  crawl.  Naturally,  not  a  ray  of 
light  penetrates  here.  Laignier  advances 
in  the  darkness,  struggling  against  suffoca- 
tion; a  mass  bars  his  way,  a  man's  body, 
large  and  heavy ;  doubtless  it  is  the  sergeant, 
for  the  lieutenant  is  a  frail,  slender  man. 


A  RESCUE  831 

The  victim  has  sensed  the  fact  that  some  one 
has  come  to  save  him:  "I'm  smothering,  I'm 
smothering,"  he  nmrmurs.  Laignier,  sitting 
down  and  pushing  with  his  legs,  moves  back- 
wards, dragging  the  body  of  the  sergeant. 
Suddenly,  the  latter,  half  awaking,  is  seized 
by  the  instinct  so  often  noticed  among 
drowning  men,  and  clutches  desperately  to 
the  arm  of  the  captain,  preventing  further 
movement.  The  situation  is  critical,  both 
the  men  may  die ;  not  a  moment  is  to  be  lost. 
Laignier  follows  the  advice  always  given  a 
rescuer  for  such  an  occasion;  with  a  blow 
of  his  fist  he  stuns  the  sergeant,  who  loosens 
his  hold. 

Arriving  at  the  foot  of  the  shaft  the  cap- 
tain rapidly  fastens  the  inert  body  to  a  rope 
that  the  others  have  let  down  from  the  top, 
and  commands,  "Haul  him  up!" 

But  hardly  has  the  sergeant  been  drawn 
yards  up  when  the  rope  breaks — there 
IS  a  fall;  the  rope  is  tied  anew  around  the 
body;  this  time  all  goes  well. 


332  BOURRU 

In  saving  the  lieutenant  another  difficulty 
arises.  At  the  mouth  of  the  second  pit, 
which  opens  at  the  end  of  the  first  horizontal 
tunnel,  twenty  yards  below  ground,  he  is 
holding  with  rigid  arms  to  a  supporting 
beam,  while  his  legs  dangle  in  the  space  be- 
low. Fortunately  he  is  a  little  chap,  far  from 
heavy ;  for  an  athlete  like  Laignier  it  would 
be  easy  to  detach  him,  but  the  captain's  tem- 
ples are  throbbing  violently,  his  vision  is 
troubled,  his  muscles  are  weakening;  several 
times  he  stops  in  the  tunnel ;  it  seems  to  him 
that  a  thick  wadding  fills  all  the  space  about 
him. 

"Did  you  think  of  death?"  I  asked. 

"Oh,  as  for  me,"  he  answered,  "you  know 
when  I  am  busy  I  don't  lose  time  thinking 
about  that;  my  sole  idea  was  to  finish  my 
job  as  fast  as  I  could." 

Both  men  were  saved. 

"But  the  best  part  of  the  story,"  says  the 
major  of  engineers,  with  whom  I  discussed 


A  RESCUE  333 

the  exploit,  "is  that  three  weeks  after,  even 
I,  the  immediate  commander  of  Captain 
Laignier,  had  not  yet  heard  of  it.  The  cap- 
tain had  forbidden  that  the  incident  be  men- 
tioned. 'Tiresome,'  he  called  it.  An  acci- 
dent revealed  it  to  me,  and  when  I  told  Laig- 
nier that  he  was  proposed  for  his  sixth  cita- 
tion, he  answered,  'If  you  wish  it,  major, 
but  on  condition  that  you  give  me  eight  days 
in  the  guardhouse,  at  the  same  time,  for  not 
having  taken  an  oxygen-tank  with  me.  Jus- 
tice has  to  be  maintained;  when  a  man  dis- 
obeys my  orders  in  that  matter  I  always  lock 
him  up  in  prison  for  eight  days.'  " 


Ill 

AN  EXPLOSION 

DELATTRE,  the  sapper,  who  is  a 
shrewd  Parisian,  perfectly  under- 
stands the  tactical  situation,  and  it 
is  simple  enough.  For  the  last  day  or  two, 
in  one  of  our  tunnels  thirty  yards  under- 
ground, distant  noises  have  been  heard  from 
the  direction  of  the  Boche.  Captain  Laig- 
nier  has  been  here,  listened  with  the  geo- 
phone,  scribbled  some  lines  and  numbers  in 
a  memorandum-book,  and  finally  said,  "Yes, 
the  Boches  are  digging  ahead  perpendicu- 
larly to  this  tunnel." 

How  shall  we  retaliate?  Have  you  seen 
two  terriers  attacking  a  cat?  One  heads  it 
off  in  front  while  the  other  noiselessly  exe- 

334 


AN  EXPLOSION 


335 


cutes  a  turn  and  pounces  on  Tommy  from 
behind.  The  whole  art  of  war  is  there, 
whether  it  be  on  land,  on  sea,  in  the  air,  or  in 
a  system  of  mines.  It  is  decided  to  apply 
that  principle  again.  Fortunately  an  old 
tunnel  of  ours,  not  located  by  the  enemy, 
proceeds  in  a  direction  nearly  parallel  to  the 
tunnel  that  the  enemy  must  be  digging.  It 
is  only  necessary  to  lengthen  it,  inclining  to 
the  right;  near  the  Boche  tunnel,  it  will  be 
blown  up,  and  thus  all  their  work  of  many 
weeks  will  go  for  naught. 

But,  as  you  well  know,  in  the  same  way 
that  the  cat  can  leap  into  the  eyes  of  the  first 
dog  before  the  second  has  pounced  on  it, 
just  so  can  the  German  sapper,  at  a  given 
moment,  decide  that  circumstances  are  fav- 
orable and  be  the  one  himself  to  set  off  the 
mine. 

Delattre  would  explain  it  better  than  I, 
but  at  the  moment  he  has  not  time  to  talk, 
for  the  sergeant  has  said  to  him,  "Go  and 
listen." 


336  BOURRU 

And  he  is  listening.  I  assure  you,  it  is  a 
pleasant  job  for  a  lazy  man.  He  lies  down 
there  at  the  end  of  the  tunnel  where  the 
sound  of  the  enemy's  pick  has  made  itself 
heard;  he  puts  his  ear  to  a  beam,  and  he 
waits. 

If  you  should  listen  you  would  hear  noth- 
ing, and  the  earth  would  only  seem  to  you  a 
great  mass  of  inert  matter,  but  to  a  good 
miner  the  earth  is  alive ;  from  its  heart  there 
mount  a  thousand  noises  which  bear  wit- 
ness to  the  fact. 

Let  me  tell  you!  A  fortnight  ago  there 
was  heard  the  distant  "toe,  toe,"  muffled  like 
the  steps  of  that  robber  who  was  walking 
about  the  other  night — you  would  have 
sworn  it — in  the  garret  of  the  old  chateau 
where  you  spend  your  vacations — you  re- 
member? "Bah!"  you  said  to  yourself, 
"there  are  so  many  noises  in  an  old  house!" 
Delattre  had  the  same  notion  as  you  at  that 
instant.  "Is  it  really  the  Boche  making  that 
noise?"     In  that  calcareous  hill  there  are 


AN  EXPLOSION 


337 


immense  fissures  several  hundred  yards  long, 
which  magnify  distant  noises.  And  it  has 
sometimes  happened  that  a  man  has  been 
alarmed  by  blows  which  he  thought  came 
from  the  enemy,  but  which  in  reality  were 
struck  by  comrades  working  two  hundred 
yards  away. 

But  a  week  after,  Delattre  had  no  longer 
any  doubt;  the  *'toc-toc"  was  distinct,  the 
Boche  were  advancing.  Oh !  he  wasn't  terri- 
fied; he  simply  confided  to  his  comrade  ^lin- 
ard,  '*No  mistake  about  it,  they  are  there." 

The  days  passed;  the  Boches  were  work- 
ing steadily.  One  morning  Delattre,  after 
having  listened  for  five  minutes,  stood  up 
very  pale,  and  said,  "They're  right  on  us — 
two  3^ards  away!" 

It  was,  perhaps,  inexact;  there  are  days 
when,  because  you  have  slept  ill  or  have  in- 
digestion, you  judge  "short";  at  other  times 
you  judge  "long."  It  all  depends  on  the 
v/aves  of  pessimism  or  optimism  which  al- 
ternate in  our  poor  human  souls. 


338  BOURRU 

The  sapper  behaved  as  you  did,  in  your 
old  chateau,  when  after  having  heard  an  un- 
accustomed noise  you  called  your  reason  to 
the  rescue,  saying  to  yourself,  "See  here, 
let's  look  coolly  at  the  situation ;  it  is  a  door 
that  is  banging."  As  for  Delattre,  he  called 
an  officer  who,  after  scientific  verification, 
tapped  the  sapper  on  the  shoulder  and  said, 
*'01d  fellow,  I'll  guarantee  that  they  still  are 
six  yards  away." 

Meanwhile,  their  comrades  were  digging 
the  curving  tunnel. 

To-day  Delattre  is  listening  with  all  at- 
tention, for  there  is  a  sign  more  terrible  than 
the  noise  itself:  it  is  silence.  It  means,  per- 
haps, that  the  Boches  consider  that  they  have 
advanced  far  enough  and  are  placing  the 
charge,  piling  up  there,  four  yards  away, 
cases  of  westphalite.  You  can't  be  sure, 
however ;  when  such  an  operation  takes  place 
you  hear  the  scraping  of  the  cases  over  the 
flooring  of  the  tunnel.  Well,  to-day  you 
hear  nothing,  but  it  may  be  that  the  Boches 


I 

I 

I 


AN  EXPLOSION  889 

have  carefully  wrapped  their  cases  in  rags. 

For  twelve  hours  the  silence  has  contin- 
ued. What  does  it  mean?  It  is  torturing, 
just  as  when  you  imagine  that  the  assassin, 
with  muffled  footsteps,  is  advancing  through 
the  darkness  of  your  chamber,  knife  in  hand 
and  ready  to  spring. 

Eighteen  hours,  twenty-four  hours  pass; 
still  the  silence,  silence  undisturbed.  What 
are  the  Boches  doing?  Is  it  an  accidental 
interruption  of  their  work,  or  are  they  pre- 
paring the  charge  ?  It  will,  perhaps,  explode 
this  very  moment,  or  the  next.  The  sappers 
have  understood  that  the  instant  is  critical. 
The  tunnel  cut  in  behind  the  enemy  is  fin- 
ished; the  officer  decides  to  place  the  charge 
Kvhich  will  cut  off  the  German  retreat.  It  is 
necessary  to  bring  something  like  a  ton  of 
cheddite  from  the  powder-magazine  over 
[two  miles  away. 

Delattre,  with  ear  glued  to  the  beam, 
stays  on  guard.  Every  instant  his  comrade 
asks,  "Are  they  working?" 


840  BOURRU 

What  a  comfort  that  would  be !  It  would 
prove  that  their  blast  is  not  ready.  Sud- 
denly Delattre  emits  a  cry  of  joy.  He  has 
just  heard  the  "toc-toc."  He  listens  still 
more  attentively;  it  is  queer,  that  "toc-toc" 
there;  it  comes  regularly,  like  the  sound  of 
a  clock ;  it  is  not  the  sound  of  the  pick,  which 
sometimes  strikes  soft  earth  and  sometimes  a 
stone.  The  sapper  understands ;  the  Boches, 
realizing  that  they  have  been  overheard,  have 
fastened  a  pick  at  the  end  of  their  tunnel  and 
are  moving  it  from  above,  by  a  rope  and  a 
system  of  pulleys,  to  give  the  illusion  that 
they  are  still  at  work.  A  banal  and  time- 
honored  trick,  but  also  a  terrible  indication; 
the  German  blast  is  ready. 

"See  here,  boys!"  says  the  sapper  to  his 
comrades ;  "we've  got  to  get  busy  and  bring 
those  bags  of  chedditel" 

Indeed,  this  is  not  the  moment  for  the 
sappers  to  stand  stunned,  stupid,  like  the 
poor  man  who,  frozen  with  terror  in  his  bed, 
dares  not  get  his  revolver  from  the  drawer 


AN  EXPLOSION 


841 


I 


I 


of  the  stand  for  fear  of  precipitating  the  as- 
sassin's onslaught.  Watch  them  well,  these 
sappers,  crawling  in  their  narrow  tunnel  less 
than  a  yard  in  diameter,  dragging  their  sacks 
of  cheddite  thirty  yards  underground,  know- 
ing that,  from  one  moment  to  the  next,  the 
German  mine  may  burst  the  wall  beside 
them.  What  would  happen  then?  Oh! 
that's  very  simple.  The  gases  from  the  ex- 
plosion would  rush  violently  through  the 
tunnel,  which  would  then  serve  the  same  pur- 
pose as  the  barrel  of  a  cannon;  the  men 
would  be  the  projectiles  which  would  be  flat- 
tened like  balls  of  papier-mache  against 
.some  wall.  .  .  .  Unless  the  pressure  of  the 
[gases  fails  to  break  through,  in  which  case 
the  tunnel  "settles" ;  that  is  to  say,  the  ceil- 
ing collapses,  like  a  hat-box  when  you  sit 
upon  it.  You  can  imagine  the  fate  of  the 
■miners  in  that  second  case.  There  is  yet  a 
third;  it  is  the  slow  infiltration  of  gases  which 
in  a  few  seconds  stealthily  smother  you  at 
the  bottom  of  the  hole.  .  .  . 


342  BOURRU 

That  day  it  was  the  Boches  who  were 
blasted,  and  we  do  not  know  to  this  hour 
which  of  these  three  hypotheses  became  for 
them  reality. 


IV 
TRAPPED   UNDERGROUXD 

ALTIiOUGJI  they  were  in  the  depths 
of  a  mine-tunnel  far  under^-ound, 
I  the  sappers  Vashn  and  Jolhvct  were 

preoccupied  with  what  was  happening  on  the 
urface  of  the  earth. 
"I  tell  you,"  asserted  Jollivet,  "there  is 
oniething   pretty   fine   in   the   shape   of   a 
ench-bombardment  going  on  up  there  right 
ow." 
"Never  you  mind  that,"  replied  Vaslin, 
ur  job  is  to  dig  half  a  yard  fartlier  in  this 
nnel;  as  for  trench-bombardments — that*s 
eir  funeral  up  above." 
And  Vaslin,  chief  digger,  went  back  to 
work.    There  have  thus  been  evolved,  in  this 

343 


844  BOURRU 

sector,  two  distinct  classes  among  the  com- 
batants, those  of  the  free  air  and  those  of 
the  mines — a  requirement  of  the  famous 
economic  principle  of  the  division  of  labor, 
which  one  is  obliged  to  apply  to  this  war,  so 
much  resembling  the  activities  of  a  factory. 

But  to-day  it  is  really  hard  not  to  pay  at- 
tention to  what  is  happening  above.  What 
a  devil  of  a  life  they  do  lead,  the  infantry, 
the  bombers,  the  gunners,  and  the  grenade- 
throwers!  The  earth  trembles,  the  planks 
of  the  supports  which  enclose  the  tunnels 
groan  under  the  distant  blows.  Certainly  at 
this  moment  French  and  Boches  must  be 
"swopping"  five-hundred-pound  torpedoes 
as  though  they  were  nothing  but  hand-gren- 
ades ;  the  things  must  be  bursting  and  shriek- 
ing everywhere.  The  hill  is  trembling  with 
it  like  the  soul  of  a  poor  wretch  shaken  by 
grief. 

"Just  the  same,"  says  Vaslin  to  Jollivet, 
"go  and  see  if  anything  has  happened  at  the 
mouth  of  the  shaft." 


TRAPPED  UNDERGROUND         845 

t  is  by  the  shaft  that  the  miner  keeps  up 
communication  with  the  rest  of  human-kind ; 
in  the  same  way  that  the  proud  mariner,  at 
large  upon  the  sweep  of  waters,  must  think 
of  the  little  port  that  will  shelter  him  some 
day,  so  the  miner,  buried  in  tlie  hea\y  mat- 
ter which  he  has  to  conquer,  has  constantly 
in  mind  the  shaft  by  which  he  issues  to  the 
liglit  of  day. 

Do  not  imagine  this  shaft  to  be  a  single 

straight  well  into  the  earth;  no,  it  proceeds 

i**in  cascades";  first  a  drop  four  yards  deep, 

then  a  twenty-yard  tunnel,  at  the  end  of 

which  there  is  another  drop  eighteen  yards 

eep,  and  so  on.    If  the  hill  were  split  in  two, 

ou  would  see  the  subterranean  runways  of 

lie  sappers  take  the  shape  of  a  gigantic 

tairway,  which  sinks  into  the  earth  in  the 

direction  of  the  enemy. 

As  Jollivet,  climbing  the  rope  ladders  of 

She  shafts  and  crawling  along  the  tunnels, 
omes  nearer  and  nearer  to  tlie  surface  of 
he  earth,  the  noise  of  the  explosions  becomes 


846  BOURRU 

more  and  more  distinct.  A  light  dust  jfloats 
in  the  air,  an  indication  so  fearsome  that  sev- 
eral times  a  terrible  thought  stops  the  sap- 
per in  his  journey;  the  entrance  to  the  shaft 
may  have  caved  in.  This  idea  strikes  him 
like  a  boulder  falling  from  the  roof  of  the 
tunnel  and  leaves  him  stupefied  for  several 
seconds,  robbed  of  strength  by  the  terror  of 
it. 

On  arriving  at  the  bottom  of  the  first 
shaft,  four  yards  deep,  Jollivet  grasps  the 
situation;  the  shelter  of  logs  which  protects 
the  opening  against  outside  bombardments 
has  collapsed,  destroyed  by  a  shell,  doubt- 
less. But  the  danger  is  not  great,  for  the 
light  still  sifts  in  through  the  displaced  tim- 
bers. 

4(  ^  4i(  #  # 

Vaslin  has  come  to  join  Jollivet.  The 
two  soldiers,  crouching  in  the  tunnel  near  the 
shaft,  wait  for  the  bombardment  to  cease; 
then  they  will  try  to  get  out.  Perhaps  some 
one  will  come  to  their  aid  and  cut  a  passage 


TRAPPED  UNDERGROUND         347 

through  the  fallen  beams.  But  the  bom- 
bardment continues.  What  new  havoc  will 
it  work?  At  each  explosion  of  a  torpedo  or 
a  210  the  soldiers  strain  their  eyes  upward 
to  make  sure  that  the  slender  ray  of  light  is 
still  there. 

Of  a  sudden  the  earth  trembles  as  though 
the  entire  globe  were  seized  with  terror;  a 
giant  shell,  plunged  deep  into  the  ground 
near  the  soldiers,  has  just  burst  and  the  vi- 
brations from  the  explosion  follow  each 
other  through  the  earth  in  waves. 

The  man  who  feels  solid  matter  thus  dis- 
turbed to  its  lowest  depths  experiences  a 
strange  mental  disorder.  Think  of  it! 
Centuries  of  experiences  have  written  deep 
upon  our  minds  the  firm  faitli  that, 
within  the  shifting  universe  of  water,  air 
and  living  beings,  one  thing  at  least  is 
firmly  fixed — the  ground  that  we  tread 
upon.  To  all  our  senses  it  is  a  stable 
element.  But  now  that  that  immov- 
able   foundation    seems    whirhng    in    the 


348  BOURRU 

general  tornado,  our  whole  mental  equilib- 
rium is  disturbed. 

The  gases  have  invaded  the  tunnel.  For 
a  few  moments  Vaslin  and  Jollivet  remain 
stunned.  When  they  succeed  in  pulling 
themselves  together,  the  darkness  around 
them  is  so  complete  that  they  have  to  grope 
about  to  find  each  other.  The  dust  must  be 
thick,  they  have  the  sensation  of  swallowing 
it  at  each  breath.  They  feel  along  the  walls 
of  the  tunnel.  Where  on  earth  is  the  shaft  ? 
Everywhere  they  encounter  only  masses  of 
earth.  The  truth  is  soon  evident.  Under 
the  force  of  the  explosion  the  walls  of  the 
shaft  have  collapsed  and  the  miners  are 
trapped  four  yards  underground. 

I  could  resort  to  powerful  language  to 
depict  for  you  the  suffering  of  these  two 
men,  thus  menaced  by  a  terrible  death,  and 
I  am  sure  that  your  kindness  would  not  be 
niggardly  in  sympathy  for  these  soldiers  of 
France,  whom  duty  has  led  to  this  inglorious 
suffocation;  but  I  have  to  tell  you  truth- 


TRAPPED   UNDERGROUND         34^9 

fully  that  I  tried  in  vain  to  find,  in  the 
course  of  a  long  conversation,  any  traces  of 
terror  which  those  tragic  moments  might 
have  left  in  the  soul  of  Vaslin. 

When  I  said,  "You  must  have  had  a  mo- 
ment of  fearful  despair,"  he  answered  with 
perfect  simplicity,  "Oh,  no,  you  see,  as  for 
me,  I  have  no  wife  or  children." 

It  was  like  the  enunciation  of  an  incon- 
trovertihle  axiom,  a  primal  verity;  the  idea 
seemed  perfectly  natural  to  him  that  a  man 
ought  not  to  dread  death  except  when  it 
may  have  unpleasant  consequences  for  oth- 
ers. This  conviction  with  him  is  as  power- 
ful as  an  instinct. 

"So,"  he  added,  "I  comforted  Jollivet  the 
best  I  could,  for  he  has  children  and  kept 
saying  over  and  over,  *]My  poor  little  ones, 
my  poor  little  ones.'  'Don't  cry,'  I  said  to 
him;  'we're  going  to  try  to  get  out  of 
here!'" 

I     For  both  of  them,  however,  there  was  a 
'moment  of  tragic  anxiety;  the  explosion  had 


350  BOURRU 

destroyed  their  sense  of  direction.  Have 
you  sometimes  had,  in  a  tunnel,  a  sudden 
impression  that  you  did  not  know  in  which 
direction  the  train  was  going?  Do  you  re- 
member the  dizziness,  the  agony,  the  sweat 
which  suddenly  stood  out  on  your  forehead, 
the  nausea?  It  was  such  a  seizure  that  the 
sappers  experienced.  In  which  direction 
should  they  dig  to  escape?  At  random,  Vas- 
lin,  who  had  brought  his  pick  along,  attacked 
the  wall  of  the  tunnel ;  JoUivet,  behind  him, 
carried  away  the  loose  earth.  They  took 
turns  at  their  tasks.  Fortunately  the  masses 
of  earth  hereabouts  have  been  so  shaken  to 
the  depth  of  three  or  four  yards  that  the  clay 
is  broken  up  and  may  easily  be  loosened  by 
the  pick.  Nearer  the  surface  the  soil  be- 
comes more  and  more  broken.  Since  the 
exit  the  men  were  digging  inclined  steeply, 
the  debris  fell  of  itself  into  the  tunnel. 

Suddenly  Vashn's  pick  goes  in  deep ;  a  ray 
of  light  reaches  him.  Where  is  he  coming 
out?     The   soldier   listens.     Not  a  sound 


TRAPPED  UNDERGROUND         351 

comes  from  above ;  the  bombardment  is  over, 
but  he  must  be  careful;  the  jDoint  where  he 
is  going  to  crawl  out  is  perhaps  in  full  view 
^f  an  enemy  sentinel. 

With  great  care  Vaslin  enlarges  the  hole 
and  peers  out.  They  are  in  a  crater  made 
by  the  explosion  of  a  mine;  imagine  a  hole 
three  or  four  yards  deep,  with  the  soldier 
emerging  at  the  bottom. 

All  at  once  he  hastily  draws  back  his 
head.  On  the  right,  up  above,  he  has  recog- 
nized the  blue  sand-bags  that  the  Bodies  use 
to  make  their  parapets.  Bad  luck!  They 
have  come  out  within  the  enemy's  lines. 
Crouched  in  their  narrow  tunnel  the  two  sap- 
pers pass  a  moment  of  profound  discour- 
agement, for  they  know  that  hill  of  Vau- 
quois — they  know  that  every  human  figure 
that  is  outlined  above  a  parapet  is  greeted 
instantly  by  a  hundred  rifle-shots.  And 
then  there  is,  perhaps,  a  Boche  sentinel  a  few 
yards  away,  behind  the  sand-bags. 

It  is  Jollivet  wlio  first  decides  to  emerge; 


352  BOURRU 

Vaslin  follows  him.  They  hoth  climb  along 
the  wall  of  the  crater ;  the  loose  pebbles  give 
under  their  hands  and  feet;  several  times 
they  have  to  begin  the  ascent  anew.  All  that 
makes  a  noise. 

They  reach  the  blue  bags ;  a  miracle !  not  a 
Boche  is  in  sight!  The  soldiers  leap  over 
the  parapet,  tumble  into  a  hole,  get  up ;  rifle- 
shots ring  out,  balls  whistle.  Like  wild  boars 
they  rush  straight  ahead.  No  barbed-wire 
here,  where  the  hostile  lines  are  twenty  or 
thirty  yards  apart!  .  .  .  Here  we  are  at 
the  home  trench !  The  bombardment  has  de- 
molished the  parapet. 

Running,  leaping,  rolling  down  the  slopes 
of  mine-craters,  the  two  sappers  reach  the 
French  trench.  Fortunately  it  is  that 
sleepy-head  of  a  Maflou  who  is  on  guard  at 
the  peep-hole ;  anybody  else  would  have  shot 
at  them,  taking  them  for  Boches.  Maflou, 
quite  dumbfounded  when  he  recognizes  them, 
never  stops  saying  in  his  surprise,  "Lord  in 
heaven!    Where  did  you  come  from?    This 


TRAPPED  UNDERGROUND 


353 


is  no  trick  to  play  on  a  fellow  I  If  you  guys 
in  the  engineers  are  going  to  come  in  this 
way  now  you  ought  to  let  us  know,  anyway  I 
Of  all  things  I    Lord  in  heaven  1" 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH 
TWENTY-THIRD,  1916 

ALL  the  sappers  knew  what  the  objec- 
tive was:  to  destroy  the  Boche 
redoubt.  Ah,  that  redoubt!  for 
months  it  had  been  the  nightmare  of  the  de- 
fenders of  the  hill.  From  this  vantage-point 
over  their  enemy's  line,  the  Boches  could,  at 
their  ease,  take  observations  covering  our 
whole  valley.  Sometimes  their  periscopes 
might  be  seen  sticking  up  there.  Moreover, 
the  place  gave  them  the  superiority  of  a  com- 
manding position  in  grenade-battles;  and 
what  is  more,  they  had  installed,  on  each  side 
of  the  redoubt,  machine  guns  which  de- 
fended all  their  lines.     At  each  encounter 

354 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH  23,  1916   355 

those  machine  guns  enfiladed  our  trenches 
with  their  deadly  fire.  That  redouht  must  be 
destroyed.  Captain  Laignier,  of  the  engi- 
neers, had  sworn  it,  and  his  sappers,  ratify- 
ing the  vow  of  their  chief,  had  promised  it 
to  their  comrades  of  the  infantry. 

ut  it  was  not  an  easy  matter.    A  shaft 

"eh  yards  deep,  a  tunnel  in  the  direction  of 
the  enemy,  and  another  shaft  ten  yards  deep 
had  been  sunk  into  the  earth  like  a  gigantic 
stairway  twenty-five  yards  under  ground. 
At  present  a  tunnel  was  being  dug  which 
was  to  be  forty  yards  long.  What  a  task! 
day  and  niglit  for  a  month  a  digger,  replaced 
every  twelve  hours,  had  been  crouched  in  that 
tunnel  less  than  a  yard  square,  scratching  at 

he  earth  without  intermission;  behind  him 
a  spader  scraped  up  the  loose  earth  and  put 
it  into  sacks,  which  were  dragged  away  by 
other  workers  and  hoisted  up  to  the  top  of 

[he  shaft. 
Moreaux,  when  he  was  digger,  sometimes 
topped  in  his  work,  wiped  his  forehead,  and 


356  BOURRU 

confided  to  his  friend  Boitier,  who  was 
spader  behind  him,  *' There's  no  use  talking, 
it'll  be  a  pretty  piece  of  work.  I  overheard 
the  captain.  It  seems  that  now  we  have  gone 
under  the  redoubt;  we  are  almost  under  the 
deepest  shelters  of  the  Boche  second  line. 
Talk  about  what  will  happen!" 

"Come  on,  cut  out  the  hot  air  and  get  onto 
the  job,"  answered  Boiter;  "you  know  that 
we  have  to  get  ahead  half  a  yard  in  our 
twelve  hours." 

But  in  proportion  as  one  advanced  in  the 
direction  of  the  enemy  a  certain  anxiety  in- 
creased,— namely,  the  fear  of  being  over- 
heard by  the  Boches,  who  had,  perhaps, 
pushed  forward  to  this  point  their  listening 
tunnels;  in  three  seconds  an  enemy  blast 
could  destroy  the  tunnel  and  asphyxiate  you. 

Luck  was  with  us ;  not  a  sound  was  to  be 
heard.  Captain  Laignier  descended  every 
day  to  the  end  of  the  hole,  listened,  examined 
the  earth  by  the  light  of  a  candle,  and  ap- 
peared satisfied.     That  put  everybody  in 


t 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH  28,  191( 

good  humor;  they  had  perfect  confidence  in 
him,  for  one  would  say  that  during  these 
eighteen  months  in  which  he  had  directed 
the  war  of  mines  in  the  hill  he  had  ac- 
quired a  sixth  sense,  by  means  of  which 
he  guessed  the  subterranean  activities  of  the 
enemy. 

But  everyone  feels  that  such  good  luck 
cannot  last.  Every  day  explosions  rip  up 
the  ground  at  other  points  within  the  hill. 
What  a  pity  if  an  accident  of  the  same  kind 
should  happen  here!  Had  you  been  digging 
away  for  more  than  a  month  in  this  tunnel, 
like  Boitier,  you  would  know  the  distress  of 
uch  a  discovery.  For  fear  of  it  poor  Boitier 
o  longer  dares  wield  his  pick  freely,  and 
yet  he  has  to  strike  with  all  his  strength  at 
this  packed  clay,  for  it  is  hard  as  rock. 

"Well,  we've  got  to  hurry,"  says  the  cap- 
tain finally;  "we'll  put  the  pneumatic  drill 
to  work." 

The  machine  is  installed  and  kept  cutting 
into  the  earth  for  several  days,  in  almost 


358  BOURRU 

complete  silence.    There  is  no  sound  from 
the  Boches. 

The  moment  comes  to  hollow  out  the 
chamber  for  the  explosives.  It  is  no  matter 
of  laying  an  unimportant  little  mine  here, 
one  of  those  insignificant  blasts  the  effects 
of  which  remain  localized  within  the  earth 
and  do  no  more  than  shatter  a  tunnel  of  the 
enemy;  no,  this  time  a  whole  German  com- 
pany is  living  comfortably,  twenty  yards 
above  us,  in  its  underground  shelter.  Some 
of  them  are  reading,  others  are  sleeping,  and 
still  others  are  cleaning  their  guns;  certain 
ones  are  dreaming  of  their  Gretchens,  back 
in  Brandenburg  or  Hesse,  who  are  proud  to 
know  that  their  sweethearts  are  so  firmly 
ensconced  upon  the  soil  of  France.  Officers 
are  lolling  in  their  fine  rest-chambers,  deco- 
rated with  objects  stolen  from  neighboring 
French  villages.  Machine  guns  are  there, 
protected  by  strong  walls  of  concrete,  ready 
to  spit  fire  at  the  French;  along  with  these 
are  little  trench-cannon  and  a  thousand  other 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH  23,  1916   359 

implements;  and  the  sentinels  are  standing 
on  the  lookout,  constantly  watching  our 
lines.  It  must  be  blown  up,  all  this  busy  lair 
of  heinous  beasts  who  have  dug  their  hole 
in  the  ancient  hill  of  the  Argonne,  on  our 
soil. 

So  we  are  not  going  to  spare  our  cheddite. 
Ten,  fifteen,  twenty  tons — we  shall  use  all 
we  can.  But  that  needs  a  lot  of  space,  and 
e  must  make  an  excavation  the  size  of  your 
ed-chamber.  Shall  we  hollow  it  out  with 
picks?  That  would  take  too  long.  We  must 
find  a  more  scientific  way.     This  clay  that 

|>ve  have  been  digging  into,  however  hard  it 
Biay  be,  is  still  compressible;  we  must  profit 
ly  that  fact.    We  will  place  just  two  hun- 
Ired  pounds  of  cheddite  here,  nicely  w^alled 
in  behind  sand-bags  so  that  the  gases  cannot 
scape.     Then  we  will  take  advantage  of  a 
oment  when  another  mine  is  going  to  ex- 
lode,  set  off  this  blast  at  the  same  time,  and 
he   Boche  will  never  notice   it.      So — the 
ick  is  done!     Down  in  the  ground  the 


__  W( 

^Bbe 


360  BOURRU 

gases  from  two  hundred  pounds  of  cheddite 
have  hollowed  out  the  earth,  and  the  mine- 
chamber  is  ready.  The  Boche  heard  only 
one  explosion,  and  has  no  suspicions. 

But  we  must  pull  out  and  carry  off  the 
sand-bags  that  are  keeping  the  gases  from 
running  through  the  tunnel.  Then  the  elec- 
tric fan  must  operate  for  two  days  contin- 
ually before  we  dare  enter  the  mine-cham- 
ber. 

And  when  we  do  enter,  there  is  conster- 
nation. Above  the  chamber,  and  not  far 
away,  can  be  heard  the  *'toc-toc"  of  a  Ger- 
man pick.  The  Boches  are  digging  a  tunnel 
toward  us. 

From  this  moment  the  work  is  feverish 
in  its  haste.  Night  and  day  the  sappers  are 
at  work  getting  the  boxes  of  cheddite,  from 
nearly  two  miles  in  the  rear,  and  carrying 
them  down  to  the  mine.  In  the  shafts  and 
yard-wide  tunnels  men  are  climbing  the 
rope-ladders,  crawling,  descending  and  as- 
cending without  pause. 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH  23,  1916   361 

During  this  work  not  a  sound  is  made,  not 
a  word  is  spoken.  You  may  be  sure  that  if 
the  Boches  noticed  the  shghtest  thing  they 
: would  set  off  a  blast;  so  we  go  barefoot  to 
prevent  any  scraping  of  slioes  against  the 
boards  as  we  crawl  along.  Within  three 
days  there  are  fourteen  thousand  pounds  of 
icheddite  in  the  chamber;  but  the  blows  from 
[the  enemy's  pick  are  coming  nearer  and 
nearer.  Cast  your  eye  over  the  scene  for  a 
moment.  Captain  Laignier  has  come  down 
from  the  mine-chamber.  One  can  stand  up 
straight  here;  and  smoking  candles  light  up 
Ihe  black  walls  of  the  cavern.  The  sappers 
are  here,  clad  only  in  loin-cloths,  for  the  heat 
\s  stifling.  The  conversation  is  in  whispers. 
The  situation  is  perilous — the  iJoches  are 
only  a  yard  or  so  above  us,  and  if  they  dis- 
cover us  they  have  only  to  place  a  few  pounds 
of  explosive  in  their  tunnel;  the  ceiling  of 
Dur  chamber,  which  there  has  been  no  time 
to  prop  up,  will  cave  in,  the  explosion  will 
Bet  off  our  tons  of  cheddite,  and  the  shock 


362  BOURRU 

will  tear  everything  and  every  man  in  our 
tunnel  to  pieces. 

Shall  we  keep  on  bringing  more  cheddite 
at  the  risk  of  disclosure,  or  shall  we  be  sat- 
isfied with  a  half-sized  mine  and  set  off 
what  we  have  already  brought  in?  Imagine 
the  terrible  problem  that  our  officer  must 
face. 

If  he  continues  to  amass  explosives  he  will 
expose  his  men  to  the  risk  of  death  from  the 
enemy's  blast,  and  even  if  he  himself  should 
escape,  he  will  have  the  disgrace  of  a  fail- 
ure; on  the  other  hand,  he  might  gain  the 
glory  of  the  greatest  bit  of  fireworks  ever 
seen  at  Vauquois.  To  order  an  immediate 
explosion  is  to  make  sure  against  the  risk 
of  a  surprise  blast  and  against  censure,  but 
it  is  also  to  accept  a  pitiful  success. 

But  I  am  the  only  one  to  analyze  this 
problem,  because  at  this  moment  I  am  seated 
here  before  my  writing-paper,  and  action  is 
not  forced  upon  me.  For  the  truth  is  that 
Captain  Laignier  had  made  his  decision, 


THE  EXPLOSION  OF  MARCH  23,  1916   363 

even  before  his  mind  had  taken  into  account 
the  difficulties  surrounding  it.  Between  pru- 
dent half-way  measures  and  thorough  work 
at  any  risk,  the  engineer  had  long  ago  made 
his  choice.  In  a  calm  voice,  as  he  walked 
about  the  chamber,  he  said  to  his  men: 

"Yes,  boys,  go  on  laying  the  mine ;  there's 
no  danger." 

And  to  prove  it  to  them  he  remained  be- 
low a  long  time.  Above  him  the  German 
continued  to  strike. 

Two  days  later  the  mine-chamber  was 
full.  Sand-bags  had  to  be  packed  along  the 
tunnel  for  at  least  twenty  yards  in  order  to 
be  sure  that  the  mine  would  send  its  blast  in 
the  right  direction. 

At  a  quarter  past  nine,  on  a  cold  March 
morning,  the  captain  is  lighting  the  fuse  at 
the  mouth  of  the  shaft.  In  one  minute  the 
mine  will  explode.  It  is  just  the  hour  when 
the  commanding  officers  of  the  Boches  are 
accustomed  to  visit  the  underground  shelters 
for  the  inspection  of  their  men  and  to  glorify 


364  BOURRU 

before  them  the  superiority  of  the  Germans 
in  modern,  scientific  warfare. 

Upon  the  opposite  hill  see  blocks  of  earth 
the  size  of  carts  flung  into  the  sky.  French 
will-power  and  French  science  have  spoken. 


APPENDIX 


I 

I 


RESUME   OF   THE    MILITARY 
OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS 

VAUQUOIS  is  one  of  the  points  on 
the  front  where  the  war  has  assumed 
a   form   pecuHarly   savage.     There 
have  been  no  periods  of  quiet  here,  as  the 
official  communiques  testify  in  mentioning 
the  name  of  the  village  so  frequently. 

The  position  is  made  up  of  a  hill,  running 
from  east  to  west,  which  rises  some  sixty 
yards  above  the  surrounding  valleys.  On 
the  west  side  flows  the  Aire,  a  river  which 
divides  the  hill-country  of  the  Argonne  into 
two  parts.  The  country  all  around  is  moun- 
tainous and  wooded.  Beyond  the  Aire  lies 
the  Argonne,  properly  so  called;  on  the 
south  is  the  forest  of  Hesse;  to  the  east  is  a 

367 


368  BOURRU 

rolling,  wooded  country,  stretching  away 
like  a  surge  as  far  as  the  eye  can  reach.  Be- 
hind the  rampart  formed  by  the  height  lies 
the  little  town  of  Varennes,  at  present  oc- 
cupied by  the  Germans. 

Before  the  war  Vauquois  was  a  pictur- 
esque little  village,  very  old  in  history,  for 
its  first  builders  were  doubtless  feudal  lords 
attracted  by  its  commanding  position. 
From  its  height  one  could  easily  defy  the 
enemy ;  on  the  north  the  descent  is  almost  a 
precipice,  and  the  southern  slope  is  very 
steep.  The  church-steeple  of  Vauquois 
reigned  proudly  over  twenty  miles  of  coun- 
tryside. 

After  the  battle  of  the  Marne  the  troops 
of  the  Fifth  Army  Corps  were  among  those 
who  were  pursuing  the  army  of  the  Crown 
Prince,  retreating  toward  Montfaucon.  It 
was  in  the  neighborhood  of  Vauquois  that 
the  great  fluctuations  of  battle  occurred, 
with  the  two  adversaries  now  advancing  and 
now  retiring,  but  always  seeking  to  consoli- 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS       369 

ate  a  position  and  establish  a  balance  of 
forces. 

At  the  end  of  September,  1914,  our  front 
passed  beneath  the  southern  slope  of  the  hill 
of  Vauquois.  The  French  staff  was  quick  to 
understand  that  the  army  could  not  remain 
in  that  position,  fully  dominated  by  the  Ger- 
mans on  top  of  the  hill.  From  his  position 
up  there,  the  enemy  had  a  magnificent  view 
throughout  the  valley  of  the  Aire,  and  could 
employ  his  artillery  over  great  distances, 
checking  its  work  by  direct  observation. 

Several  times  we  endeavored  to  take  pos- 
session of  the  hill ;  among  others,  on  October 
30  and  December  8,  1914.  But  in  spite  of 
the  bravery  of  our  troops,  the  operations 
were  unsuccessful,  for  the  Germans  were  in- 
trenched in  formidable  strength  upon  the 
height,  and  the  attackers,  from  the  nature 
of  the  terrain,  had  to  work  under  great  dis- 
advantages. The  whole  winter  passed  in 
this  way. 

About  January  20,  1915,  the  Tenth  Di- 


370  BOURRU 

vision,  under  the  command  of  General  Val- 
dant,  took  possession  of  the  sector,  which  it 
had  already  held  up  to  November  7,  1914. 
It  was  here  that  this  division  was  to  make  it- 
self illustrious  by  carrying  the  position  and 
by  clinging  to  the  hill-top,  under  unbeliev- 
able conditions,  for  nearly  two  years. 

The  first  attempt  upon  the  hill  was  made 
on  February  17.  The  onslaught  of  our 
troops  (the  Thirty-first  and  Seventy-sixth 
Infantry)  was  terrific.  The  battalion  of 
Cuny,  of  the  Thirty-first,  made  a  splendid 
entrance  into  Vauquois  and  held  the  place 
for  several  hours.  But  on  that  day  we 
gained  cruel  experience  of  the  power  of  the 
machine  guns.  A  number  of  these  guns 
which  had  not  been  destroyed  by  the  prepar- 
atory bombardment  mowed  down  our  men 
on  the  height.  It  was  in  vain  that  our  in- 
fantry attacked  the  protected  nests  of  these 
machine  guns;  the  position  had  to  be  relin- 
quished. 

After  this  new  check  the  capture  of  Vau- 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS       371 

quois  seemed  a  still  more  formidable  task. 
And  yet  it  was  so  necessary  that  on  tlie  very 
night  following  the  fruitless  attempt  the 
general  of  the  division,  choking  down  the 
tears  that  had  come  into  his  eyes  at  the  mo- 
ment when  he  saw  his  soldiers  mowed  down 
by  the  machine  gims,  declared  with  all  the 
force  of  his  nature — "We  shall  begin 
again !" 

And  on  February  28,  the  attack  began 
again,  under  the  orders  of  General  Valdant, 
commanding  the  division,  and  in  the  presence 
of  General  JMichcIer,  commanding  the  corps, 
and  of  General  Sarrail,  commanding  the 
army. 

By  midday  the  effect  of  the  270-millimcter 
guns,  whicli  had  been  brought  up  especially 
for  this  attack,  seemed  considerable;  the  vil- 
lage was  nothing  but  a  heap  of  ruins.  At 
1:15  the  troops  designated  for  the  duty  ad- 
vanced bravely;  at  1;45  the  general  in  com- 
mand of  the  Thirteenth  Brigade  reported 

it  three  of  his  battalions  had  entered  Vau- 


372  BOURRU 

quois.  At  two  o'clock  a  German  counter- 
attack forced  our  left  flank  to  fall  back,  and 
a  flanking  fire  from  Cheppy  obliged  our 
right  to  do  likewise.  On  top  of  the  hill  we 
therefore  found  ourselves  in  the  position  of 
an  arrow-head  projecting  from  the  rest  of 
the  line — a  considerable  advantage  for  the 
Germans.  At  3:15  the  Eighty-ninth  Infan- 
try took  up  the  attack  again  with  vigor,  and 
reoccupied  Vauquois.  The  battalion  of  Cle- 
menson,  of  the  Forty-sixth  Infantry,  retook 
the  German  trenches  and  held  them  with 
great  tenacity.  At  five  o'clock  a  terrific 
bombardment  fell  upon  the  position  and 
forced  our  troops  to  return  to  their  initial 
lines. 

On  March  1  the  attack  was  resumed  by 
the  Thirty-first,  supported  by  the  Forty- 
sixth  and  the  Eighty-ninth,  in  the  zones 
where  each  of  these  regiments  had  operated 
in  the  preceding  battle.  Brigadier-General 
Bassenne  was  in  charge  of  the  action  of  the 
several  regiments.     At  eleven  o'clock  the 


OPERATIONS   AT  VAUQUOIS        373 

artillery  began,  and  at  two  the  infantry 
attacked,  in  spite  of  the  heavy  fire  of  the 
enemy's  guns,  with  the  same  bravery  as  be- 
fore. At  2:45  the  Thirty-first  Regiment, 
commanded  by  Lieutenant-Colonel  Cuny, 
made  its  way  into  Vauquois,  the  Forty-sixth 
was  on  the  outskirts  of  the  village,  and  the 
Eighty-ninth,  under  the  command  of  Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Le  Vannier,  was  consolidat- 
ing its  position  in  Vauquois  witli  the  Thirty- 
first.  At  3:15  two  German  counter-attacks, 
on  the  east,  were  brilhantly  repulsed  at  the 
point  of  the  bayonet,  with  the  aid  of  our 
field-pieces. 

I  At  four  o'clock,  the  enemy  still  resisting, 
the  last  battalion  of  the  Forty-sixth,  which 
had  been  held  in  reserve,  was  sent  forward. 
At  5:30  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  the 
Germans  to  attack  from  the  forest  of 
Cheppy  was  stopped  by  the  fire  of  our 
artillery. 

At  six  o'clock  our  line  of  resistance  was 
established  along  the  soutliern  street  of  the 


374  BOURRU 

town.  Colonel  Simon,  of  the  Forty-sixth, 
immediately  undertook  to  reestablish  order 
in  our  dispersed  units,  and  Captain  Laignier 
of  the  engineers  began  the  organization  of 
the  conquered  terrain.  During  the  night  the 
Forty-sixth  made  two  attempts  to  get  pos- 
session of  the  church.  A  mountain  gun  was 
carried  up  to  Vauquois. 

Vauquois  was  ours. 

The  weeks  that  followed  saw  extremely 
hard  fighting.  Each  of  the  adversaries  oc- 
cupied one  slope  of  the  hill.  On  the  top  the 
hostile  lines  ran  from  five  to  thirty  yards 
apart.  But  the  French  trenches,  which  were 
still  shallow,  were  under  enfilading  fire  from 
the  artillery  at  Cheppy,  on  the  east,  and  that 
of  the  Argonne  on  the  west. 

The  trench  bombarding  machines  at  once 
assumed  an  important  role.  The  bombard- 
ments, called  "crapouillotages"  by  the  men, 
occurred  several  times  a  day;  they  consisted 
of  an  incessant  stream  of  projectiles  of  every 
sort,  and  we  had  not  yet  had  time  to  dig  shel- 


OPERATIONS   AT  VAUQUOIS        375 

ters.  The  underground  war  also  began 
quickly. 

During  this  period  the  losses  were  heavy". 
Because  it  was  important  to  enlarge  the 
gains  made  on  IMarch  1,  several  further  at- 
tacks were  ordered.  On  ]March  15,  the  Sev- 
enty-sixth gained  fifty  yards  in  a  marvellous 
onslaught,  and  on  the  next  day,  supported 
by  the  Forty-second  Colonials  and  certain 
battalions  of  the  Thirty-first,  it  repulsed  a 
hostile  counter-attack.  The  trench-mortars 
and  hand-grenades  proved  tlieir  value  on 
this  day. 

The  regiments  relieved  one  another  in  the 
positions,  and  each  one  made  it  a  point  of 
honor  to  obtain  an  advantage  over  the 
enemy.  Attacks  and  surprises  came  in  great 
numbers,  grenade  combats  were  intense,  and 
demonstrations  of  bravery  and  endurance 
abounded.  On  JMarch  19  three  men  made 
their  way  back  into  our  lines  after  having 
spent  three  days  in  a  cellar  with  Germans 
all  round  them. 


376  BOURRU 

On  March  22  the  Germans  sprinkled  our 
trenches  with  liquid  fire.  Surprised  by  this 
new  kind  of  warfare,  we  gave  way.  But 
the  next  day,  at  nine  in  the  morning,  the 
Forty-sixth  and  the  Eighty-ninth  gallantly 
retook  the  lost  trench. 

Every  day  machines  of  combat  were  being 
perfected  on  both  sides,  and  the  trench-mor- 
tars were  coming  to  be  of  great  caliber.  In 
April  the  Germans  began  to  throw  a  new 
type  of  grenade  that  can  be  attached  to  the 
gun,  which  the  men  call  "rat-tails,"  and 
which  produce  powerful  explosions. 

On  the  fifth  and  sixth  of  April  there  was 
an  attack  from  the  V  de  Vauquois — a  part 
of  the  hill  from  which  the  enemy  still  en- 
joyed a  good  view.  The  assault  was  carried 
out  by  the  Forty-second  Colonials  and  the 
Eighty-ninth  Regiment,  and  was  accom- 
plished amid  terrific  machine-gun  fire  from 
both  sides.  During  the  days  that  followed, 
the  bombardment  was  so  intense  that  every 
wire  entanglement  between  the  lines  was 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS        377 

destroyed  and  the  ruins  of  the  village  were 

I  gradually  reduced  to  chips  upon  the  hill- 
top. 
The  cantonments  in  the  rear  were  not 
spared.  Aubreville  and  Courcelles  were  de- 
stroyed by  the  enemy's  gun-fire.  The  regi- 
ments not  in  the  front  line  were  kept  in  shel- 
ters constructed  in  the  forests.  From  mo- 
ment to  moment  tlie  enemy  turned  loose  a 
*  zone  of  fire  upon  some  part  of  the  forest. 
I  All  the  roads  were  dangerous,  and  death 
j  often  surprised  men  on  detail  duty — cooks, 
workers  of  all  kinds  going  about  the  sector, 
even  four  or  five  miles  behind  the  line  of  fire. 
I  During  May  the  battle  continued  without 
I  intermission  on  the  position — bombard- 
ments, "crapouillotages,"  mines,  incendiary 
shells,  grenades,  and  what  not. 
In  June  we  took  reprisals  by  liquid  fire. 
A  munitions-depot  of  the  Germans  caught 
fire  and  exploded  with  a  formidable  uproar. 
The  heaps  of  litter  encumbering  the  position 
— beams,  logs,  hurdles,  and  debris  of  every 


378  BOURRU 

nature — took  fire  also.  The  hill  was  like  one 
immense  torch.  But  the  wind  was  unfavor- 
able to  the  operation,  and  it  was  not  fully 
successful. 

On  July  13  and  14  the  enemy  directed  fu- 
rious attacks  against  Hill  263,  three  miles 
west  of  Vauquois.  At  the  same  time  the 
sector  was  violently  bombarded,  especially 
the  point  called  the  Barricade,  where  the 
kitchens  had  been  established.  On  July  30 
German  aviators  threw  bombs  on  us.  On 
July  31  the  headquarters  of  the  brigade  and 
division  generals  were  under  fierce  bombard- 
ment. 

For  months  now  the  war  underground  had 
been  waged  continuously;  there  was  not  a 
week  without  its  mine  explosion. 

The  artillery  duels  became  more  and  more 
frequent.  As  for  combats  of  grenades, 
aerial  torpedoes,  and  trench-mortars,  they 
were  raging  daily.  Deep  tunnels  were  dug 
into  the  ground,  where  the  men  remained 
whenever  they  were  off  duty. 


I 

I 
I 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS       379 

Very  frequently  we  saw  General  Hal- 
louin,  commanding  the  army  corps,  going 
about  the  battle  zone  conferring  with  the  di- 
vision general  about  the  establishment  of  new 
lines  of  defense  or  new  emplacements  for 
batteries.  Thanks  to  the  complete  technical 
competence  of  these  officers,  all  the  men  felt 
that  the  positions  consolidated  in  the  sector 
were  impregTiable. 

And  so  the  months  passed.  Winter  came 
gain  with  no  diminution  of  the  rage  of  the 
combatants;  the  tunnels  were  full  of  water, 
and  the  trenches  on  the  western  side  of  the 
jhill,  in  the  sector  of  Bourreuilles,  were  mere 
kewers  in  which  a  man  sank  into  mud  and 
kvater  up  to  his  waist.  Some  men  were  ac- 
tually drowned.  But  not  an  inch  of  territory 
was  given  up.  Brigadier-General  Bassenne, 
[utilizing  his  knowledge  of  engineering,  in- 
fvented  certain  types  of  shelters  that  im- 
proved the  material  existence  of  the  men. 
I  He  had  much  success  in  this  work,  to  our 
great  satisfaction. 


380  BOURRU 

The  spring  of  1916  came.  The  troops  of 
the  Tenth  Division  were  still  on  the  spot; 
life  at  Vauquois  was  more  and  more  perilous ; 
mine-explosions,  and  on  a  much  larger  scale, 
had  become  daily  occurrences.  On  March 
23,  for  instance,  we  set  off  an  explosion  of 
forty  thousand  pounds  of  cheddite.  The 
space  between  the  trenches  was  now  nothing 
but  a  series  of  craters,  connecting  with  one 
another,  joining  one  another  to  form  a  con- 
tinuous ravine. 

Some  of  these  holes  were  as  much  as  thirty 
yards  deep,  and  their  steep  walls  were  so 
difficult  to  chmb  that  sometimes  deserters 
from  the  Germans  who  had  once  got  down 
into  a  crater  could  not  get  out  again,  because 
the  loose  earth  gave  way  under  their  hands 
and  feet  in  climbing. 

The  surface  of  the  hill  had  become  a  mere 
mass  of  ruins  in  wood  and  stone ;  there  were 
no  longer  any  trenches — ^we  had  to  be  con- 
tent to  build  up  each  night  a  parapet  of 
sand-bags  behind  which  watchers  were  sta- 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS       881 

tioned.  During  the  day  the  parapet  would 
be  demolished  by  bombardment  or  mine-ex- 
plosions; it  would  be  rebuilt  at  nightfall. 
By  this  time  the  rifle  was  almost  out  of  use 
as  a  tool  of  war — a  soldier  took  an  occasional 
shot  through  his  peep-hole,  but  only  to  tes- 
tify that  we  were  still  there. 

At  the  moment  of  the  German  attack  on 
Verdun,  Vauquois,  which  stands  some  fifteen 
miles  west  of  that  city,  experienced  terrific 

[.attacks.    The  moment  was  critical;  the  bri- 
gade commanders.   General  Bassenne  and 

ItColonel  Pinoteau,  were  unremitting  in  their 
ivatchfulness.  The  bombardment  was  as 
regular  and  methodical  as  a  deluging  rain; 
210-millimeter  shells  and  200-pound  torpe- 
loes  were  falling  constantly.  From  this  mo- 
ment on,  it  became  impossible  to  live  outside 

the  tunnels;  only  the  sentinels  remained  in 

Ihe  front  line,  and  the  other  troops  were  held 
underground,  ready  to  emerge  at  the  first 
lignal.    This  underground  life,  in  which  one 

Itemains  for  fourteen  davs  and  nif^clits  under 


382  BOURRU 

the  menace  of  perpetual  death  that  may  fall 
from  the  sky  or  spring  up  from  the  bowels 
of  the  earth,  is  one  of  indescribable  torture. 

And  still  our  morale  remained  admirable, 
and  the  division  never  ceased,  in  spite  of  all, 
to  love  its  glorious  ground  of  battle.  Dur- 
ing its  long  stay  there  the  sector  had  been 
transformed  into  a  little  home.  One  knew 
all  its  nooks  and  paths.  The  chief  officers 
had  remained  the  same  since  the  famous  days 
of  the  first  attack,  and  the  men  loved  them. 
His  friendliness,  his  cahn  and  smiling  good- 
humor,  and  the  force  of  his  character,  tem- 
pered by  kindliness,  gained  great  popularity 
for  the  division  general.  When  he  had 
passed  through  the  trenches,  chatting  famil- 
iarly with  the  men,  one  would  invariably  hear 
this  opinion  of  him:  "Some  fine  old  boy,  all 
right!" 

Of  course,  there  were  times  when  the  sol- 
diers "kicked";  it  would  require  great  ig- 
norance of  human  nature  to  expect  the 
contrary.    But  men  must  be  judged  by  their 


I 


OPERATIONS  AT  VAUQUOIS  383 
acts  rather  than  by  their  words,  and  the  sol- 
diers of  Vauquois  performed  acts  that  will 
entitle  them  to  a  magnificent  halo  of  glory- 
when  an  impartial  historian  shall  have  told 
their  great  deeds. 

After  twenty-two  months  at  Vauquois,  the 
Tenth  Division  left  the  sector,  to  seek  other 
destinies  in  other  places. 


THE  END 


14  DAY  USE          ^^ 

RETUKN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 

JAN    71966 

6 

RFr-n 

'IFf:    f    ■    .     r        , 

-jVI 

•-^AiM  DEpt-^ 

LD  21A-60m-10,'65 
(F7763sl0)476B 

General  Library 

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